The World Crisis The Aftermath

Camp’^

Rashtrapati Bhavan
New Delhi

Accn. No. I S S f

Call No.

WORICS BY TBtE. SAJltlB AJJ'THOR

THE WOEX,X> CRISIS, iqii— 1914
THE WOEEE CRISIS, 1915
THE WORLE CRISIS, 19x6—1918

LIEERA.LIS 3 M AISTE THE SOCIAL RRO-
ELElVt

MY AERICAIM JOURISTEY
LORD RAINEOLRH CHURCHILL
IAN HAMILTON'S MARCH
LONDON TO LADYSMITH VIA RRE-
TORIA
SAVROLA
THE RIVER WAR

THE STORY OR THE MALAKAND
FIELD FORCE

THE

WORLD CRISIS

THE AFTERMATH

BY

THE RT. HON. WINSTON S. CHURCHILL,

C.H., M.P.

THORNTON BUTTERWORTH LIMITED
15 BEDFORD STREET, LONDON, W.C.2

JVdT

X

•AS.j^T>-^ x^TtxjsrT^B:!!* xisr <3^3 r.:h: j!Vtp 33 ^tx-x* A-x 2?t

^AJIX rigjlx^s r’4B»«a:"V'e<3l

TO

ALL WHO HOPE

ERRATA.

p. 75, line 5, for ' Cambridge ’ read ‘ London

p. 280, line 5 from end, for ‘ an Iririiman ’ read ‘ bom in Ireland

PREFACE

T his volume completes the task I tmdertook nearly
ten years ago of making a contemporary contribu-
tion to the history of the Great War. As in previous
volumes, the record and discussion of world-famous events
is strung upon the thread of personal narrative. This
method wUl justify itself to the reader who seeks to form
his own opinion from a number of similar authentic accounts.
It involves, however, considerable variation in the pro-
portion of events. Thus episodes and transactions which I
took part in mj^elf, or had direct knowledge of, naturally
obtain exceptional prominence. Wherever possible I have
told the tale in my own words written or spoken at the
time. The proper adjustments must be made in pages
where this occurs. I tell the tale as I saw it unfold. But
others saw it from a different angle, and there was much
that I did not see.

I have been surprised in writing of the events with which
this volume deals, to find the nxunber of important affairs in
which I was personally concerned which had utterly passed
from my mind. In these years the press of business was
extreme ; developments succeeded each other in ceaseless
transformation ; the whole world was in flux at the same
moment ; one impression effaced another. It is only when
I re-read the speeches, letters and memoranda of the time
that these intense and exciting years live again for me. I
am sure that there is scarcely any period about which more
has been recorded, more has been forgotten and less is under-
stood, than the four years which followed the Armistice. It
may therefore be a serviceable act to present a general view
of the scene — albeit from a personal angle — and still more to
trace through a lab5nrinth of innumerable happenings the
unique and inexorable sequence of cause and effect.

9

lO

PREFACE

Most of the books written since the war have dealt with
the Peace Conference in Paris, upon which a voluminous
literature exists. My work during these years was concerned
mainly with what happened outside the halls of Paris and
Versailles, and with the consequences of the decisions — and
not less of the delays — of the Plenipotentiaries upon great
countries and millions of people. It is with these external
reactions therefore that this volume mainly deals. It is
unhappily for the most part a chronicle of misfortune and
tragedy. Whether this tenor was inevitable or not the
reader must judge. In no period of my ofdcial life, extend-
ing now over nearly a quarter of a century, was public
business so diflScult as in these post-war years. Events were
crowded and turbulent. Men were tired and wayward.
Power was on the ebb tide ; prosperity was stranded ; and
money was an increasing worry. Not only therefore were
the problems hard and numerous, but the means for coping
with them continually diminished. Moreover it was not
easy to adjust one’s mind to the new dimensions. It was
hard to realize that victory beyond the dreams of hope led
only to weakness, discontent, faction and disappointment ;
and that this was in itself a process of regrowth. I there-
fore wish to judge with special compunction the shortcom-
ings and errors of those who at the summit filled the most
difficult positions of all.

It is perhaps necessary for me to repeat here, as in the
former volumes, that all the opinions expressed are purely
personal and commit no one but myself. I have also to
express my thanks to those who have so powerfully assisted
me with advice and knowledge, or who have allowed their
confidentially spoken or written opinions to be quoted.

WINSTON SPENCER CHURCHILL.

Chartwell.

January i, 1929.

CONTENTS

CHAPTER PAGE

I The Broken Spell . . . . -17

Four Centuries of Persistency — ^The Pageant of Vic-
tory — Rejoicing and Reaction — ^The Masters of the
World — ^An Armistice Dream — The Rendezvous —

Russia — Germany’s Opportunity — The New Arm —

The NewNobility — Abnormal Conditio ns — ^An Unfore-
seeable Situation — The Shock of Peace — ^The Broken
SpeU.

II Demos ....... 32

Ministry of Munitions Problems — ^Work, Wages and
Raw Material — ^Munitions Demobilization — ^The War
Unity — The Revival of Party Politics — ^Mr. Lloyd
George and the Liberals — ^The Peace Conference and
its Delegates — ^The General Election — The Hard Line
— ^The National Temper — ‘ Hang the Kaiser ’ —

' Make them Pay ’ — ^Methods of Payment — ^How
much ? — ^Letters to Constituents — ^The Prime Minister
on the Indemnity — ^Result of the Election — Its After-
effects.

Ill Demobilization ..... 52

The Formation of the New Government — ^At the
War Of 5 .ce — A Serious Situation in the Army — ^The
Remedy — ^The New System — ^A Dangerous Interlude
— ^Imponderabilia — ^The Calais Mutiny — On the
Horse Guards’ Parade — ^The Young Guard — Conduct
of the ex-Soldiers — ^The Blockade — ^Lord Plumer’s
Dispatch — ^The Territorial Army — ^The German
Prisoners.

IV Russia Forlorn ..... 70

The Absentee — ^The Nameless Beast — ^A Retrospect
— ^The Revolution of March, 1917 — ^The Grand
Repudiator — The Liberal Statesmen — Kerensky —
Savinkov — The Bolshevik Punch — ^The Dictatorship
— Peace at any Price — Brest-Litovsk — Bolshevik
Disillusionment — ^The German Advance — Effect of
the Treaty.

11

12

CONTENTS

CHAPTER PAGE

V Intervention ...... 86

Kornilov and Alexeiev on the Don — ^The Rise of the
Russian Volunteer Army — ^The Munitions at Arch-
angel — Grave Situation in the West — An American-
Japanese See-Saw — ^A New Feature : Professor
Masaryh — ^The Czecho-Slovak Army Corps — The Bol-
shevik Treachery — ^Astounding Retaliation — ^Allied
Intervention in Siberia — The Omsk Government — ^A
Surprising Transformation — The Baltic States — Fin-
land — Poland — Pilsudski — ^The Ukraine — Bessarabia.

VI The Fourteen Points .... 104

President Wilson — ^The Fourteen Points — ^The Armis-
tice Negotiations — Colonel House's Commentary —

The Meeting of October 29 — ^Mr. Lloyd George's
Refusal — Colonel House's Threat — The Prime Min-
ister Obdurate — ^Allied Reservations — ^The Freedom
of the Seas — ^Agreement reached — The French Plan
— The Preliminaries of Peace — ^Wilson's Mission —
Dangers of Delay — ^The Gap.

VII The Peace Conference .... 120

1814--1919 — ^The Literature — ^A Film Production —

Wilson at his Zenith — ^The Congressional Elections —

The Adverse Senate — Wilson's Misconceptions — ^The
Consequences — ^The * Plain People * — ^The Secret
Treaties — Under Duress — ^The Disclosure — ^The True
American View — ^The Defence of the Allies — ^The
British Peace Delegation — ^The British Empire Dele-
gation — The Composition of the Conference — Pres-
ident Wilson's Compromise — The Press — The Of&cial
Languages — Europe in Convulsion.

VIII The League of Nations .... 141

Three Phases — A Defective Procedure — The Supreme
Council — A Dual Association — The League of Na-
tions Commission — Origin of the Covenant — ^The
British Contribution — Scepticism — ^The President's
Credentials — ^The Question of Mandates — The Domin-
ions>' View — ^The President and the Dominions
Prime Ministers — ^The Period of Commissions —

‘ Make them Pay ' — ^Mr. Keynes's Book — ^The Solu-
tion — ^War Criminals — ^The Ladder of Responsibility
— ^The Kaiser — Growing Impatience — ^The Covenants
Achieved — The Foundation Stone.

IX The Unfinished Task .... 163

Commitments at the Armistice — Lord Balfour's
Memorandum of November 29 — British and French
Spheres of Interference — ^The French at Odessa — ^At
the War Of 5 .ce — Prinkipo — ^The Conference in Paris —

My Proposals — Correspondence with the Prime
Minister — ^The Bullitt Mission — ^The Situation Worsens
— Koltchak — Advance of the Siberian Army — ^The

CONTENTS

13

CHAPTER PAGE

Big Five question Koltcb.ak — ^Note to Koltchak — ^His
Reply — Decision of tke Great Powers to Support Him
— Too Late.

X The Triumvirate ..... 184

Wilson and Preliminary Terms — ^Mr. Baker's Second
Film Effect — German Version — ^The Garbled Ex-
tract — President Wilson's Second Voyage — A Change
of Mood — Balfour's Achievement — ^The Polish
Report — End of the Council of Ten — ^The Threatened
Exodus — Mr. Lloyd George's Memorandum of March
25 — ^M. Clemenceau's Rejoinder — ^Mr. Baker's Blun-
der — The Triumvirate — The German Revolution —
Germany's Survival.

XI The Peace Treaties .... 202

The Territorial Settlements — ^The Outstanding Fea-
tures — ^National Self-determination — Its Application
— ^Alsace-Lorraine — Schleswig — ^The Rebirth of Po-
land — ^The Eastern Frontier of Germany — Upper
Silesia — ^The British Empire Delegation — Its Modera-
tion — ^Mr. Lloyd George's Handicap — ^The Upper
Silesian Plebiscite — What Britain Risked — ^The Case
of France — The French Demand for Security — ^The
Rhine Frontier — ^The Disarmament of Germany — The
Demilitarized Zone — ^The Joint Guarantee — Its Sequel
— ^The Fate of Austria-Hungary — ^The Innocent and
the Guilty — Czechoslovakia : The Czechs — Czecho-
slovakia : The Slovaks — ^Yugo-Slavia — ^Rumania —
Hungary — ^Austria — ^The Anschluss — ^Bulgaria — ^The
General Design.

XII The Russian Civil War .... 232

A Ghost War — The Peasants — ^Their Suitors — ^Half
Policies — ^Lord Curzon's Criticism — ^North Russia —

The New Brigades — ^The Rear-guard — Evacuation —

A Parting Blow — Obligations Discharged — Collapse
of Koltchak — Withdrawal of Aid — ^The Czechs : The
Imperial Treasure — ^Betrayal of Koltchak — His Exe-
cution — ^Denikin's Effort — ^Vast and Precarious
Conquests — Poland — ^Denikin's Responsibilities — His
Failure — Anti-Semitism — ^Ruin of Denikin — ^Allied
Responsibility — ^Lack of Concert — Situation in De-
cember 1919 — ^The Refugees — ^The Final Horrors.

The Miracle of the Vistula .

The Linch-pin — ^Poland's Problem — Poland's Dan-
gers — ^The Bolshevik Concentration — The Polish
Advance — ^The Ukraine — ^The Invasion of Poland —

The Armistice Negotiations— The Deadly Terms —
Warsaw ; The Miracle — Decisive Result® — Sum-
ming up — ^Lost Possibilities — ^A Consolation — ^An
Advantage,

XIII

262

14

CONTENTS

CHAPTER

XIV

XV

XVI

VII

The Irish Spectre .....

Self-Preservation — Clianging Proportions — ^The Irish
at Westminster — Ireland at the Outbreak of War — ^The
Conscription Question — ^The Sinn Fein Members —
Their Merciful Boycott — ^The Beginning of Irish Dis-
order — ^The New Home Rule Bill — Its Decisive Im-
portance — ^The Black and Tans — The Military View
— ^Authorized Reprisals — ^The Prime Minister's Atti-
tude — Cabinet Divergencies — The Craig-de Valera
Interview — Sir Nevil Macready's Report — ^The King's
Speech in Ulster — The Response — ^A Grave Decision
— ^The Truce — Prolonged Negotiations — ^Within the
Dail — ^The Irish Conference — Stresses in the Unionist
Party — Political Tension — ^Resignation Inadmissible
— ^Acid Hatreds — ^The Ultimatum — ^The Agreement
Signed — Lloyd George and Ireland.

The Irish Settlement ....

De Valera's Repudiation — ^The Debate in the Dail —
I become Responsible for carrying out the Treaty —
The Main Objectives — ^The Defence of Ulster — Irish
Leaders — ^A Preliminary Survey — Craig and Collins
— ^The Irish Free State Bill — ^The Boundary Question
— Passage of the Bill — ^Limerick and Tipperary —
Letter to Mr. Collins — ^Rory O'Connor seizes the Four
Courts — ^Further Letter to Mr, Collins — ^A Further
Letter.

The Rise of the Irish Free State

The Election Compact — Crumbling Foundations —
Reactions in the North — ^Letter to Sir James Craig —
The Whitsuntide Debate — Patience or Credulity ?
Michael Collins — Pettigo and Belleek — ^The Irish Con-
stitution : The Election — ^Murder of Sir Henry Wilson
— Critical Parliamentary Situation — ^Intervention of
Mj. Bonar Law — Resolve of the Government — ^Attack
on the Four Courts — ^A Decisive Effort — Letter to Mr.
Collins — ^Letter to Sir James Craig — ^Deaths of Grif-
fith and Collins — Cosgrave and O’Higgins — The Corner
Turned — ^The Future.

Turkey Alive. .....

Turkey before the War — ^The Offer of the Allies — ^The
Pan-Turks — Enver — German-Turkish Plans — ^The
Requisition of the Turkish Battleships — ^The Goeh&n —
Enver's Coup d*j^tat : The Final Crash — ^After the
Armistice— American Criticism — President Wilson's
Commission — Insurgence and Paralysis — ^A Deadly
Step — ^The Greek Descent on Smyrna — ^Turkey Alive
— Justice changes Camps — A New Turning-point —
Headlines — Ferid — ^The Melting of the Armies —

PAGE

277

308

329

353

CONTENTS

15

CHAPTER PAGE

Restrictions and Illusions — ^Talks about Constanti-
nople — Cabinet Decision — ^The Treaty of Sevres — The
March of Facts — ^Attack on the Ismid Peninsula — ^My
Letter of March 24.

XVIII The Greek Tragedy .... 379

A Retrospect — ^The Rise of Venizelos — Greece in the
Great War — Constantine's Divine Right — ^The General
Victory — Commitments in Thrace and Smyrna — ^The
Young King — ^The Monkey's Bite — ^The Greek Elec-
tion — Fall of Venizelos : Its Reactions — Return of
Constantine — Isolation of Greece — ^Mr. Lloyd George’s
View — Curzon and Montagu — Unofficial Encourage-
ment — ^My Own Position, February 22, June ii and
J une 2 5 — ^The Greek Advance — The Battle of Eskishehr
— ^The Battle of the Sakaria — A Further Opportunity
— ^Armenia and the Pan-Turks — The 1915 Massacres
— ^The Turkish Conquest — ^The Friends of Armenia
— Obliteration Once More.

XIX Chanak ....... 409

The Greek Soldier — ^The Silent Strain — British Indif-
ference : French Antagonism — ^America Absent —

The Appeals of Gounaris — ^An Exhausted Lloyd
George — ^The Agreement with Russia — ^Turkish
Atrocities — ^The Greek Design upon Constantinople —

The Decisive Battle : Ahum Karahissar — ^Destruc-
tion of the Greek Army — ^A Grave Situation — ^The
Reckoning — ^The iJQ'eutral Zone — ^Alarm and De-
spondency — ^The British Fleet — The Telegram to the
Dominions — ^The Official Communique : September
16 — ^The Issue Explained — ^The Telegram overtaken —
Response of the Dominions — French and Italian Re-
tirement — Military Measures — ^The Chanak Position
— Strategic Reassurance — ^My Memorandum of Sep-
tember 30 — Kemal's Alternative — ^Mudania — ^The
Crisis ended — ^The Treaty of Lausanne.

XX The End of the World Crisis . . 439

A General Survey — ^The Decisive Act — The German
War-plan — Mobilization and War — The Emperor's
Test — The Deadly Current — The Frontiers and the
Ivlame — ^The Yser and the Deadlock — ^The Goeben and
Turkey — ^The Dardanelles — ^Defensive versus Offen-
sive — ^The Rhythms of History — President Wilson’s
Part — ^War without Glamour — Ancient Limitations —
Modem Destructive Power — Only a Prelude — Uni-
versal Suicide — ^Is it the End ? — France and Germany
— ^British Policy — ^Locarno — ^The Twin Pyramids —

The Urgent Task.

Appendix ...... 461

Index ....... 467

TABLE OF MAPS, CHARTS, ETC.

FACING

PAGE

Russia and Northern Asia ..... 102

Europe ........ 230

Russia ......... 276

Turkey ........ 438

IN TEXT

North Russia

Ireland .....

The Battle of Eskishehr

The Battle of the Sakaria River

PAGE

• 243

• 351

• 399

. 401

16

CHAPTER I
' THE BROKEN SPELL ’

Four Centuries of Persistency — ^The Pageant of Victory — Rejoicing
and Reaction — ^The Masters of the World — ^An Armistice Dream
— The Rendezvous — Russia — Germany’s Opportunity — The
New Arm — ^The New Nobility — Abnormal Conditions — An
Unforeseeable Situation — ^The Shock of Peace — ^The Broken
Spell.

T he conclusion of the Great War raised England to the
highest position she has yet attained. F or the fourth
time in four successive centuries she had headed and sustained
the resistance of Europe to a military tyranny ; and for
the fourth time the war had ended leaving the group of
small States of the Low Countries, for whose protection
England had declared war, in full independence. Spain, the
French Monarchy, the French Empire and the German
Empire had all overrun and sought to possess or dominate
these regions. During 400 years England had withstood
them all by war and policy, and all had been defeated and
driven out. To that list of mighty Sovereigns and supreme
military Lords which already included Philip II, Louis XIV
and Napoleon, there could now be added the name of
William II of Germany. These four great series of events,
directed unswervingly to the same end through so many
generations and all crowned with success, constitute a
record of persistency and achievement, without parallel in
the history of ancient or modem times.

But other substantial advantages had been obtained.
The menace of the German navy was destroyed and the
overweening power of Germany had been for many years
definitely set back. The Russian Empire which had been
om: Ally had been succeeded by a revolutionary government
which had renounced all claims to Constantinople, and
which by its inherent vices and inefficiency could not soon

17 B

Folir

Centuries

of

Persistency.

The

Pageant of
Victory.

i8 THE WORLD CRISIS : the aftermath

be a serious military danger to India. On the other hand,
England was united with her nearest neighbour and oldest
enemy — France — ^by ties of comradeship in suffering and
in victory which promised to be both strong and durable.
British and United States troops had fought for the first
time side by side, and the two great branches of the English-
speaking world had begun again to write their history in
common. Lastly, the British Empire had stood every
shock and strain during the long and frightful world con-
vulsion. The parliamentary institutions by which the life
of the Mother Country and the self-governing Dominions
found expression had proved themselves as serviceable for
waging war as for maintaining freedom and progress in times
of peace. The invisible ties of interest, sentiment and
tradition which across all the waters of the world united
the Empire had proved more effective than the most binding
formal guarantees, and armies of half a million Canadians,
Australians and New Zealanders had been drawn by these
indefinable and often imperceptible attractions across greater
distances than any armies had travelled before, to die and
conquer for a cause and quarrel which only remotely affected
their immediate material safety. All the peoples and all
the creeds of India during the years of crisis had made in
their own way a spontaneous demonstration of loyalty, and
sustained the war by arms and money on a scale till then
unknown. The rebellion in South Africa in 1914 had been
repressed by the very Boer generals who had been our most
dangerous antagonists in the South African War, and who
had signed with us the liberating treaty of Vereeniging.
Only in parts of Ireland had there been a failure and a
repudiation, and about that there was a lengthy tale to
teU.

The pageant of victory unroUed itself before the eyes of
the British nation. All the Emperors and Kings with whom
we had warred had been dethroned, and all their valiant
armies were shattered to pieces. The terrible enemy whose
might and craft had so long threatened our existence, whose
force had destroyed the flower of the British nation,
annihilated the Russian Empire and left all our Allies
except the United States at the last gasp, lay prostrate at

‘THE BROKEN SPELL’

19

the mercy of the conquerors. The ordeal was over. The
peril had been warded off. The slaughter and the sacrifices
had not been in vain and were at an end ; and the over-
strained people in the hour of deliverance gave themselves
up for a space to the sensations of triumph. Church and
State united in solemn thanksgiving. The whole land made
holiday. Triple avenues of captured cannon lined the MaU.
Every street was thronged with jubilant men and women.
All classes were mingled in universal rejoicing. Feasting,
music and illuminations turned the shrouded nights of war
into a blazing day. The vast crowds were convulsed with
emotions beyond expression ; and in Trafalgar Square the
joy of the London revellers left endtuing marks upon the
granite plinth of Nelson’s coliunn.

Who shall grudge or mock these oveipoweiing entrance-
ments ? Every Allied nation shared them. Every victori-
ous capital or city in the five continents reproduced in its
own fashion the scenes and sounds of London. These
hours were brief, their memory fleeting ; they passed as
suddenly as they had begun. Too much blood had been
spilt. Too much life-essence had been consumed. The
gaps in every home were too wide and empty. The shock
of an awakening and the sense of disillusion followed
swiftly upon the poor rejoicings with which hxmdreds of
millions saluted the achievement of their hearts’ desire.
There still remained the satisfactions of safety assured, of
peace restored, of honour preserved, of the comforts of
fruitful industry, of the home-coming of the soldiers ;
but these were in the backgroimd; and with them all
there mingled the ache for those who would never come
home.

* Itl )iC III *

Along the British lines in France and Belgium deven
o’clock had produced a reaction revealing the mysterious
nature of man. The cannonade was stilled ; the armies
halted where they stood. Motionless in the silence the
soldiers looked at each other with vacant eyes. A sense of
awe, of perplexity, and even of melancholy stole coldly
upon men who a few moments before had been striding

Rejoicing

and

Reaction.

20

THE WORLD CRISIS : the aftermath

Rejoicing

and

Reaction.

forward in the ardour of hot pursuit. It was as though an
abyss had opened before the conquerors’ feet.

' Unarm I Eros ! The long day's work is done.’

The figh ting troops seemed for a time incapable of adjusting
themselves to the abrupt relaxation of strain. So quiet
were the forward camps on the night of victory that one
would have thought they belonged to brave men after doing
their best at last defeated. This wave of psychological
depression passed as quickly as the opposite mood in
Britain ; and in a few days Home had become the founda-
tion of all desires. But here again were disillusion and
hope deferred.

> afe * He ♦ ♦

On the night of the Armistice I dined with the Prime
Minister at Downing Street. We were alone in the large
room from whose walls the portraits of Pitt and Fox, of
Nelson and WeUington, and — ^perhaps somewhat incon-
gruously — of Washington then looked down. One of the
most admirable traits in Mr. Lloyd George’s character was
his complete freedom at the height of his power, responsi-
bility and good fortune from anything in the nature of
pomposity or superior airs. He was always natural and
simple. He was always exactly the same to those who
knew him well : ready to argue any point, to listen to dis-
agreeable facts even when controversially presented. One
could say anything to him, on the terms that he could say
anything back. The magnitude and absolute character of
the victory induced a subdued and detached state of mind.
There was no feeling that the work was done. On the
contrary, the realization was strong upon him that a new
and perhaps more difficult phase of effort was before him.
My own mood was diAuded between anxiety for the future
and desire to help the fallen foe. The conversation ran on
the great qualities of the German people, on the tremendous
fight they had made against three-quarters of the world,
on the impossibility of rebuilding Europe except with their
aid. At that time we thought they were actually starving,
and that under the twin pressures of defeat and famine the
Teutonic peoples — already in revolution — ^might slide into

'THE BROKEN SPELL’

31

the grisly gulf that had already devoured Russia. I sug- The Masters
gested that we should immediately, pending further news, worid.
rush a dozen great ships crammed with provisions into Ham-
burg. Although the armistice terms enforced the blockade
till peace was signed, the Allies had promised to supply
what was necessary, and the Prime Minister balanced the
project with favouring eye. From outside the songs and
cheers of multitudes could be remotely heard like the surf
on the shore. We shall see that different sentiments were
soon to prevail.

)ic « sK

On that November evening the three men at the head
of Great Britain, the United States and France seemed to
be the masters of the world. Behind them stood vast
communities organized to the last point, rejoicing in victory
and inspired with gratitude and confidence for the chiefs
who had led them there. In their hands lay armies of
irresistible might, and fleets without whose sanction no
vessel crossed the sea upon or beneath the surface. There
was nothing wise, right and necessary which they could
not in unity decree. And these men had been drawn
together across difierences of nationality and interest and
across distances on land and sea by the comradeship of
struggle against a dreaded foe. Together they had reached
the goal. Victory absolute and incomparable was in their
hands. What would they do with it ?

But the hour was fleeting. Unperceived by the crowd
as by the leaders, the spell by which they had ruled was
already breaking. Other forms of authority would presently
come into play and much might yet be done. But for the
supreme tasks, for the best solutions, for the most service-
able policies NOW was the only time.

These men must come together. Geographical and con-
stitutional obstacles are mere irrelevancies. They must
meet face to face and settle swiftly after discussion the
largest practical questions opened by the total defeat of the
enemy. They must relegate to a lower plane aU feelings
of passion roused in conflict, all considerations of party
politics in the countries they represent, all personal desire
to continue in power. They must seek only the best arrange-

22

THE WORLD CRISIS : the aftermath

An ments possible for the brave nations that had followed them,

for a tormented Europe and an awe-struck world.

If they could come together they would face realities
and discern the proportion of events. The German, Austrian
and Turkish Empires and all the mighty forces that had
held the victors in check so long had yielded themselves
helpless and disarmed. But the task was unfinished.
Other foes remained in the field; other impulsions chal-
lenged the authority of the victors and barred a fair settle-
ment of the world's affairs. W ell might they have bethought
themselves of the Roman motto ‘ Spare the conquered and

war down the proud.’

* * ♦ ♦ ♦

The reader may perhaps at this point be willing to study
some speculative questions in a purely imaginary form.
Let us then for a few moments leave the region of ‘ What
happened ’ for those of ‘ What might have happened.’
Let us dream one of the many Armistice dreams. It is
only a dream.

:|e 4c ifc 4s ik

The victory produced an astonishing effect upon President
Wilson. His responsibility and glory lifted him above the
peace-time partisanship in which so much of his life had
been lived. At the same time it exercised a sobering effect
upon his judgment of foreign countries and their affairs.
As soon as he received the joint message of Lloyd George
and Clemenceau proposing a meeting in the Isle of Wight
(or perhaps it was Jersey) before the end of November, he
realized that he must go, and that whatever had happened
in the past he must go as the representative of the whole
of the United States. He asked himself what his position
would be in history if he pledged the faith of his country
without warrant, or if what he promised in his coxmtry’s
name was not made good. So, in the very flush of success,
he appealed to the Senate of the United States to fortify
him with a delegation of their strongest men, having due
regard to the Republican majority in that body. ‘ I can-
not tell,’ he said, ‘how party affairs will develop in the
next few years, but nothing compares with the importance
of our bearing our part in the peace as our soldiers have

'THE BROKEN SPELL’

23

borne theirs in the war. We have been drawn against our
wish, against our whole tradition into the affairs of Europe.
We have not entered without reason, we will not quit
without honour.’

Clemenceau said (to himself) ; ‘ I have got to think of
the long safety of France. Not by our own exertions alone
but by miracles we have been preserved. The greatest
nations in the world have come to our aid and we are deliv-
ered out of the deadly peril. Never again can we hope for
such aid. A thousand years will not see such fortunate
conjunctures for France. Now is the appointed time for
making friends with Germany and ending the quarrel of so
many centuries. We, the weaker, have got them down ;
we, the conquerors, wiU lift them up.’

As for Lloyd George, he said : ' History will judge my
record and wiU not find it unworthy. In order to win
through in this war I have destroyed every political founda-
tion by which I rose and on which I stood. But after
aU, life is a brief span, and all that matters is not to fall
below the level of events upon the greatest occasions. The
British people have good memories, and I shall trust to
them.’

So these three men met within three weeks of the Armis-
tice in the Isle of Wight (or was it Jersey ?) and settled
together the practical steps which should be taken to set
the world on its feet again in an enduring peace.

Meanwhile the Delegation from the Senate of the United
States proceeded direct to Paris and visited their armies at
the front.

When the three men met together they found themselves
in complete agreement that a League of Nations must be
set up not as a Super-State but as a Super-Function above
all the valiant and healthful nations of the world. But
they saw that they could only plant a tree which would
grow strong enough as the years passed by, and at their
first meeting, which might have occurred on December i,
1918, they agreed that a League of Nations must embrace
all the dominating races of the world. This was their fixst
Resolution. Wilson said, ‘ I can answer for the United
States, because I have behind me both the great parties,

An

Armistice
Dream :

The

Rendezvous.

24

THE WORLD CRISIS : the aftermath

An

Armistice
Dream :
Russia.

t he Republicans as well as my own Democrats/ Lloyd
George said: ‘I speak for the British Empire and am
sustained by the Prime Ministers of all the self-governing
Dominions; and moreover both Mr. Asquith and Mr.
BonarLaw have consented to support me till the settlement
is made, when it is my inflexible resolve to withdraw (I
wiU not say for ever) from public affairs.'

Clemenceau said : ‘ I am seventy-five years old and I
am France.’

So they said : ‘ It is no use setting up a League of Nations
without Russia, and Russia is stfll outside our jurisdiction.
The Bolsheviks do not represent Russia, they represent an
international conception of human affairs entirely foreign
and indeed hostile to anything we know of civilization ;
but the Russians stood by us in the worst of the war and
we owe it to them that they have a fair chance of national
self-expression.’

They then agreed to their second Resolution : The Russian
people must he enahlei to choose a naiional assembly before
whom the present issues can be laid.

So they sent for Marshal Foch and asked him, ‘ What can
you do about Russia ? ’

Foch replied : ' There is no great difficulty and there need
be no serious fighting. A few hundred thousand American
troops who are longing to play a part in events, together
with volunteer units from the British (I am afraid he said
'' English ”) and French armies can easily with the modem
railways obtain control of Moscow; and anyhow we hold
already three parts of Russia. If you wish your authority
to embrace the late Russian Empire for the purpose of
securing the free expression of the Russian wish, you have
only to give me the order. How easy this task will be to
me and Haig and Pershing compared with restoring the
battle of the 21st March or breaking the Hindenburg Line ! ’

But the statesmen said : ‘ This is not a military proposi-
tion only, it is world politics. To lay hands on Russia,
although no doubt physically practicable, is morally too
big a task for the victors alone. If we are to accomplish
this it can only be with the aid of Germany. Germany
knows more about Russia than anyone else. She is at this

‘THE BROKEN SPELL’

25

moment occupying as sole guarantee of civilized life the
richest and most populous parts of Russia. Germany let
Lenin loose on Russia. Ought she not to play her part in
dealing up this whole eastern battlefield like the others ? ’
And they said, ‘ This will be the opportunity for Germany.
This will enable a proud and faithful people to avoid all
humiliation in defeat. They will slide by an almost uncon-
scious transition from cruel strife to natural co-operation
with all of us. Nothing is possible in Europe without
Germany and everything wiU be easy with her.'

Then they passed the Third Resolution : That Germany
shall he invited to aid in the liberation of Russia and the re-
building of Eastern Europe.

But Foch said: ‘How will you guarantee the life of
France ? ’ and the President and Mr. Lloyd George in their
turn replied : ‘ Within the limits of the Fourteen Points the
hfe of France wiU be guaranteed by the English-speaking
peoples throughout the world and by all the states and
races associated with them.’

Then, having settled all vital matters, the three chiefs
turned for a moment to the expenses of the war. But this
presented no difiiculty. Evidently only one principle could
rule, namely. Equality of Sacrifice. There were three fac-
tors to be fused, — ^loss of blood, loss of treasure, and on the
other hand — ^rated very high — acquisition of territory.
They laughed a little at the idea of appraising life in terms
of money and deducting territorial gains therefrom. But
they said : ‘ Though money is no doubt an inadequate
token, it is the handiest we have in our present state of
development. After all we only require a mathematical
formida which experts can work out at the same time they
are calculating the reparations of Germany and the defeated
countries. Much has been destroyed that can never be
repaired, but if we all stand together the burdens even on
the vanquished need not be very great. We will have a
world bank-note on the double security of Victory and
Reconciliation. To the support of this, all will contribute
on a basis which wiU recognize the difference between win-
ning and losing. It might perhaps eventually become the
foundation of a universal currency. Anyhow, so long as

An

Annistice
Dream ;
Germany’s
Opportunity,

26

THE WORLD CRISIS: the aftermath

An

Armistice
Dream :
The New
Arm.

we are agreed upon the principle we can easily have the
applications worked out.’

Then they went back to the League of Nations plan.
No doubt once all the greatest nations were included, their
moral force alone was an immense security for peace and
justice. An almost universal trade and financial boycott,
and total exclusion from the seas, were additional severe
deterrents upon an aggressor. Credit, food, munitions were
strong defences for the attacked. But surely the august
authority of the League must not shrink in the last resort
from the use of force !

It is not known which of the three chiefs first conceived
the master-plan by which the peace of the world is now so
well defended that national armsunents are falling into
increasing neglect. But history records the fact that on
the second day of conversation it was decided that the new
instrument of world-order should be armed with the new
weapons of science. Nations great or small might, if they
wished, for their own reassurance have battleships and
cruisers, cavalry, infantry and artillery, and spend their
money as they chose on these ; but war from the air and
war by chemical means were reserved to League and to inter-
national authority alone.

At the moment when science had produced weapons
destructive of the safety and even the hfe of whole cities
and populations, weapons whose action was restricted by
no frontiers and could be warded off neither by fleets nor
armies, a new instrument of human government would be
created to wield them. Conversely, just as this new instru-
ment was coming into being, the new weapons which it
required were ready to its hand. But with that practical
spirit which shone in these three experienced statesmen,
they proclaimed at once the principle and its gradual
application. Every state signatory of the Covenant would
in the first instance dedicate to the League so many squad-
rons of aeroplanes. From these a new force would be
formed. ‘ We are reviving, in fact,’ said Clemenceau, ' the
old Orders of chivalry like the Knights Templars and the
Knights of Malta to guard civilization against barbarism.’
Here he made a remark of a somewhat irreverent character

‘THE BROKEN SPELL’

27

which has escaped the chronicler. ‘ There is certainly no An
lack/ said the President, ‘ of knights whose renown is
deathless to found the Order. French, British, American,
German, Italian aces have performed exploits for which
there is no counterpart in human annsds. Let these be the
new nobility. ’ ‘ At any rate,’ said Lloyd George, ‘ they
are better than the profiteers who are sitting on my door-
step every day.’

So it was agreed that in principle the power of the air
should be reserved to the League of Nations for the purpose
of maintaining world peace against aggression. No absolute
veto was placed in the first instance upon national air forces,
but the whole emphasis of the policy of the Great Powers
would be laid upon building up the International Air Force,
with the intention that as general confidence grew only
commercial aviation should be developed nationally, and
the military aspect should be reserved to international
authority alone.

They thought the question of chemical warfare too diffi-
cult to settle at the moment further than by a universal
decree forbidding any individual nation to practise it.

‘ Perhaps, however,’ it was added, ‘ some day recalcitrant
nations will be punished by being made to sneeze and if
all else fails, to vomit.’

As they were going to bed on the third night of their
talks someone inquired ‘ What will happen if our peoples
will not take our advice ? ’ Then they all said, ‘ Let them
get somebody else. We shall have done our bit.'

It was at this moment that the speU broke. The illusion
of power vanished. I awoke from my Armistice dream,
and we all found ourselves in the rough, dark, sour and
chilly waters in which we are swimming still.

* * >» * *

Great allowances must be made for the behaviour of
all the peoples and of all their governments — victors and
vanquished alike — as they emerged from the furnace of
fifty-two months’ world war. The conditions were outside
all previous experience. At the outbreak with all its un-
known and measureless possibilities the flood of crisis
flowed along channels which for some distance had already

28 THE WORLD CRISIS: the aftermath

Abnormal been prepared. The naval and military leaders and the

Conditions, behind them assumed the immediate direction ; and

they had plans which, whether good or bad, were certainly
worked out in the utmost detail. These plans of scientific
havoc were put into execution ; and the second series of
events arose out of their clashings. Every War Ofi&ce and
every Admiralty emitted laconic orders, and for a while
the consequences followed almost automatically. The im-
mense forces of destruction, long gathered and stored, were
released. When a battleship is launched the operation is
short and simple. A few speeches are made ; a few prayers
are said ; a bottle of champagne is broken ; a few wedges
are knocked away ; and thousands of tons of steel swiftly
gathering momentum glide irrevocably into the water.
Very different are the problems of bringing that same ship,
shattered in action, ripped by torpedoes, crowded with
wounded, half fuU of water, safely back to harbour through
storm and mist and adverse tides.

Of course, for more than a year before the war ended
plans had been prepared for demobilization and for recon-
struction. Men had been withdrawn from the conduct of
the war to study and elaborate the measures consequent
upon an assumed successful peace. But they were not in
any sphere the dominant figures. All other eyes were
riveted on the war. The whole mind of the state, every
energy winch it could command, were concentrated on victory
and self-preservation. This other field of interest — ^h3q)0-
thetical, contingent, remote — was but dimly lighted. What
had we to do with peace while we did not know whether
we should not be destroyed ? Who coixld think of recon-
struction while the whole world was being hammered to
pieces, or of demobilization when the sole aim was to hurl
every man and every shell into the battle ?

Moreover, the governing minds among the Allies never
expected the war to end in 1918. Behind the advancing
armies all thought and preparation were concentrated upon
the spring campaign on the Meuse or on the Rhine. It
was to be the greatest campaign of all. More millions of
men, more thousands of cannons, more tens of thousands of
shells a week ; aeroplanes by the hundred thousand and

‘THE BROKEN SPELL’

29

tanks by the ten thousand : new deadly engines, inventions
and poisons of diabolical quality applied upon a gigantic
scale : all were moving forward under the ceaseless impulse
of the whole effective manhood and womanhood of every
warring state. And then suddenly peace ! The ramparts
against which the united battering-rams of the strongest
part of mankind were thundering disintegrated, leaving
behind them only a cloud of dust into which the Allies
and aU their apparatus toppled headlong forward and lay
sprawling.

The British Empire, apart from its navy, had only come
gradually into the war. The armies had grown up division
by division. The front had broadened a few miles at a
time. The transformation of industry had taken years.
Compulsion for national service and all the grinding codes
of wartime had come into force by almost insensible degrees.
We were in fact just approaching our maximum potential in
every material sphere. The limits of our war effort in
quantity and quality were everywhere in sight. How long
those efforts could have been maintained at the highest pitch
is unknowable, for at the culminating point every form of
resistance simultaneously collapsed.

The dire need and the high cause which had cemented
the alliance of twenty-seven states and held their workers
and their warriors in intensifjdng comradeship, vanished in
a flash. The scythe that shore away the annual swathes of
youth stopped at the very feet of a new generation. Those
who had braced themselves for the ordeal gazed stupefied
rather than thankful at the carnage from which they had
been withheld. The current of man’s will and of his fate
was suddenly, not merely stopped, but reversed. Therefore,

I hold that for us at any rate the transition to peace was
more violent than the entry into war, and that it involved
a more complete and universal revolution of our minds.

The men at the head of the victorious states were sub-
jected to tests of the most trying kind. They seemed all-
powerful : but their power was departing. Although it
was departing, the appearance of it remained for a space :
and it might perhaps be recalled by great action. But
time was paramount. With every day’s delay it became

Aa

Unforesee-

able

Situation.

30

THE WORLD CRISIS : the aftermath

The Shock
of Peace.

more difficult to gather the fruits of victory. With every
day the power not only of statesmen, but of the Allied
nations themselves, and their unity, must decline. Their
armies must come home ; their electorates must regain
their sway. Jealousies, factions, revenges long pent up now
advanced on every side. Yet every day was so full of
important and urgent business, and so disturbed by jostling
personalities and events, that human nature could not
cope with the task. Was it strange that these men should
3deld themselves to the illusion of power, to the relief of
victory and to the press of business ? Was it strange that
they should wish to draw breath before beginning new
tasks? They remained for some time under the impres-
sion that the same strenuous controls would continue m
other forms and that equal powers and sanctions would be
available for overcoming the new difficulties. In fact, how-
ever, just as the ship was coming into port more than half
the rudder had dropped off without the men at the helm
perceiving it.

The former peace-time structure of society had for more
than four years been superseded and life had been raised to
a strange intensity by the war spell. Under that mysterious
influence, men and women had been appreciably exalted
above death and pain and toil. Nothing had been too hard
to bear or too precious to cast away. Unities and comrade-
ships had become possible between men and classes and
nations and grown stronger while the hostile pressure and
the common cause endured. But now the spell was broken :
too late for some purposes, too soon for others, and too sud-
denly for all ! Every victorious country subsided to its old
levels and its previous arrangements ; but these latter were
found to have fallen into much disrepair, their fabric was
weakened and disj ointed, they seemed narrow and out of date.
The boundless hopes that had cheered the soldiers and the
peoples in their tribulations died swiftly away. The vision
of a sunlit world redeemed by valour, where work would be
less and its recompense more, where Justice and Freedom
reigned together through centuries of unbroken peace — that
vision which had flickered over the battlefields and beckoned
from behind the German or Turkish trenches, comforting

‘THE BROKEN SPELL’ 31

the soldier’s heart and fortif3diig his strength, was soon
replaced by cold, grey reality. How could it have been
otherwise? By what process could the slaughter of ten
mini on men and the destruction of one-third of the entire
savings of the greatest nations of the world have ushered
in a Golden Age ? A cruel disillusionment was at hand for
all. All men, aU women, all soldiers, all citizens were looking
forward to some great expansion, and there lay before them
nothing but a sharp contraction ; a contraction in material
conditions for the masses ; a contraction in scope and com-
mand for those who had raised themselves by their qualities
— and they too were numbered by the hundred thousand —
to stations of responsibility.

With the passing of the spell there passed also, just as
the new difficulties were at their height, much of the excep-
tional powers of guidance and control. The triumphant
statesmen, the idols of the masses, acclaimed as saviours
of their countries, were stiU robed with the glamour of war
achievement and shod with the sanctions of Democracy.
But their hour was passing ; their work was almost done,
and Wilson, Clemenceau and Lloyd George were soon to
follow into retirement or adversity the Kings and Emperors
they had dethroned.

To the faithful, toil-burdened masses the victory was
so complete that no further effort seemed required. (Ger-
many had fallen, and with her the world combination
that had crushed her. Authority was dispersed; the
world unshackled; the weak became the strong; the
sheltered became the aggressive; the contrast between
victors and vanquished tended continually to diminidi. A
vast fatigue dominated collective action. Though every
subversive element endeavoured to assert itself, revolu-
tionary rage like every other form of psychic energy burnt
low. Through all its five acts the drama has run its course ;
the light of history is switched off, the world stage dims, the
actors shrivel, the chorus sinks. The war of the giants has
ended ; the quarrels of the pygmies have begun.

The Broken
Spell.

Ministry of

Munitions

Problems.

m

CHAPTER II
DEMOS

Ministry of Munitions Problems — ^Work, Wages and Raw
Material — ^Munitions Demobilization — ^Tbe War Unity — ^The
Revival of Party Politics — ^Mx. Lloyd George and the Liberals
— ^The Peace Conference and its Delegates — ^The General
Election — ^The Hard Line — ^The National Temper — ‘ Hang the
Kaiser ’ — ‘ Make them Pay ' — ^Methods of Payment — How
much ? — ^Letters to Constituents — ^The Prime Minister on the
Indemnity — Result of the Election — Its After-effects .

W E must first of aU unravel our own domestic affairs
guided by the thread of personal narrative.

On the afternoon of November ii I assembled the
Munitions Council and directed their attention to the
immediate demobilization of British industry. The pro-
blems were intricate and perplexing. Nearly all the mines
and workshops of Britain were in our hands. We controlled
and were actually managing all the greatest industries.
We regulated the supply of aU their raw materials. We
organized the whole distribution of their finished products.
Nearly five milli on persons were directly under our orders,
and we were interwoven on every side with every other sphere
of the national economic hfe.

Certainly the organization and machinery of which we
disposed was powerful and flexible in an extraordinary
degree. The able business men among us, each the head
of a large group of departments, had now been working for
a year and a half in a kind of industrial cabinet. They were
accustomed to unexpected changes enforced by the shifting
fortunes of war. Four or five of them, representing the
departments involved in any project, would put their heads
together in an intimate and helpful manner ; and in a very
few hours — at most in a few days — orders would be given
which worked smoothly downwards through innumerable

32

DEMOS

33

ramifications. There was very little in the productive
sphere they could not at this time actually do. A requisi-
tion, for instance, for half a million houses would not have
seemed more difficult to comply with than those we were
already in process of executing for a hundred thousand
aeroplanes, or twenty thousand guns, or the medium artillery
of the American army, or two million tons of projectiles.
But a new set of conditions began to rule from eleven
o’clock onwards. The money-cost, which had never been
considered by us to be a factor capable of limiting the
supply of the armies, asserted a claim to priority from
the moment the fighting stopped. Nearly every manifesta-
tion of discontent on the part of the munition workers had
in the end been met by increases of wages — (‘ Let ’em have
it and let’s get the stuff ’) — and the wage rates now stood
at levels never witnessed in England before or since. The
intensity of the exertions evoked by the national danger
far exceeded the ordinary capacities of human beings. All
were geared up to an abnormal pitch. Once the supreme
incentive had disappeared, everyone became conscious of
the severity of the strain. A vast and general relaxation
and descent to the standards of ordinary life was imminent.
No community could have gone on using up treasure and
life energy at such a pace. Most of all was the strain
apparent in the higher ranks of the brain workers. They
had carried on uplifted by the psychological stimulus which
was now to be removed. ‘ I can work till I drop ’ was
sufficient while the cannon thundered and armies marched.
But now it was peace ; and on every side exhaustion, nervous
and physical, unfelt or unheeded before, became evident.

The first question was what to do with the five naillion
munition workers whose work and wages had to be provided
week by week. It was dear that the majority of these
would very soon have to find new occupations, and
many hundreds of thousands would have to change
their place of abode. More than one and a half million
women were employed in the war industries, and had proved
themselves capable of making nearly every conceivable
commodity and of earning wages on piece work far in excess
of what the strongest men had earned before the war. If

c

Work,
Wages and
Raw
Material.

34

THE WORLD CRISIS : the aftermath

Work,
Wages and
Raw
Material.

the soldiers returning from the front were to find employ-
ment in any of the known industries, all these had in a few
months to quit the factory for the home. How would they
feel about this transformation of their life and outlook ?
In the meanwhile the main situation was stUl uncertain.
An armistice is not a peace. The impression of the
German might was still strong upon all of us. No orders
of demobilization had been issued or were imminent.
At the best there would be an interval of months before
large numbers of soldiers could return. Enormous pro-
grammes of war material were in every stage of completion.
Were they all to be stopped at a stroke ? Was a gun or a
tank or an aeroplane, almost ready, to be scrapped as it
stood ? Obviously no new raw materials should be con-
sumed. The tap could be turned off at the source. But
the outflow of what was already pouring through the vast
system could not be sealed up without throwing five
million persons simultaneously into idleness. Could they
be left without wages ? Could they, on the other hand, be
paid their inflated wages for doing nothing, while the
armies were stiU on guard abroad on only soldiers’ pay ?
Were there no dangers to social order in leaving these great
numbers, whether paid or unpaid, to drift aimlessly about
the cities and arsenals without any sense of guidance from
the organization which hitherto had gripped them all ?

Fortunately an immense amount of work had been done.
My predecessors, Mr. Montagu and Dr. Addison, had in 1916
and 1917 studied the subject. In the spring of 1917 the latter
had appointed a Reconstruction Department to collect infor-
mation, and in July this had been expanded into a Ministry
of Reconstruction of which Dr. Addison became the head.
This Ministry had the prime duty of making plans for
demobilization. For the special question of the liquidation
of war contracts and the transition to peace production I
had appointed in November 1917 a standing committee of
the Munitions Council under Sir James Stevenson. This
body, with numerous sub-committees, had pursued its task
in spite of all the distractions of war and a massive report
had been completed by the beginning of October 1918.
The whole field had therefore been surveyed and we were

DEMOS

35

able to take the decisions which the situation required
with knowledge of what each step involved and how it
could be carried out.

Compromise solutions were adopted. There was to
be no immediate general discharge of mimition workers ;
all who desired to withdraw from industry or to leave
for any reason and all who could be absorbed elsewhere
were at once to be released. Holidays were lavishly given.
The production of guns and ammunition, aircraft and
explosives was to be reduced by the abolition of overtime,
by the suspension of systems of pa57ment by results, and by
a reduction of work hours to half the normal week. An
elaborate scheme of unemplo 3 mient donation prepared
beforehand mitigated loss of wages. We were able to issue
these instructions the same afternoon. They involved,
however, the ruling that war material more than 6o per
cent, advanced would generally be finished. The rest with
all raw material on the spot was to be dispersed for removal
by sea or rail and diverted to its probable peace-time
destination. Thus for many weeks after the war was over
we continued to disgorge upon the gaping world masses of
artillery and military materials of every kind. It was
certainly waste, but perhaps it was a prudent waste.

These arrangements worked smoothly and although the
Ministry of Munitions was twice visited by mass deputa-
tions of ten or twelve thousand persons from Woolwich
and other great establishments in London no serious hard-
ships or discontents were caused. Large numbers of war
volunteers employed as ‘ dilutees ’ and a considerable
proportion of women workers dispersed to their homes in
a steady flow. Day after day we continued to liberate
industry. A catalogue of the commodities successively
freed from control in their prearranged order would be an
instructive treatise on modem industry. But I forbear.
In two or three months the Ministry of Munitions had
dispossessed itself of the greater part of its extraordinary
powers and had cleared the path of peace-time industry.
Credit is due to the group of able business men whose
thought and action ensured this swift transition.

« tie 4c ♦

Munitions

Demobiliza-

tion.

The War
Unity.

36 THE WORLD CRISIS: the aftermath

The removal of the paramount war motive made men
conscious not only of exhaustion but of party politics.
The gale no longer raged, and as the tide went out all the
rocks and shallows, the stranded wreckage, the lobster-pots
and local sewage outfalls became visible in detail from the
esplanade. The outbreak of hostilities had found the British
Isles plunged in an extremity of faction, not only fantastic
but fun of danger. The Conservative and Liberal masses,
each under the impulse of their own Irish party — Orange
or Green — charged against each other in hearty vigour and
increasing disregard of national consequences. In Ireland
both sides had begun unlawfully to arm and organize for
lethal conflict ; and it was cheerfully supposed that, even
if actual bloodshed was confined to Irish soil, each side in
Ireland would be reinforced from their respective partisans
in Great Britain. The ordinary party strife between Right
and Left provided a well-sustained accompaniment to the
Irish chorus. In the midst of these festivities Armeigeddon
arrived.

Under the new spell all political values and relationships
were instantly transmuted; all that was deep and per-
manent in our island life became dominant : and it could
then be perceived, had there been leisure for moralizing,
how many times over what we felt and cherished in common
exceeded the importance of our quarrels. In the space at
most of a few days party bitterness disappeared. The
Conservative leaders hastened to support the Ministers they
had so long denounced. The rival party machines became
one pervasive recruiting agency. Except for a handful of
unlucky politicians who committed themselves to pacifism
before the issues were plain, aU opposition to the war was
obliterated. Ulster sent the smuggled rifles, on which she
had believed her life depended, to arm the Belgians. The
two Redmonds and the whole Nationalist Party proclaimed
the accession of Ireland to the cause of the Allies ; Dr.
Clifiord and the leaders of the Free churches manned the
platforms of war meetings ; the overwhehning majority of
Trade Unionists earnestly endorsed the national action.

In the main all these forces had continued throughout the
whole struggle, especially in its worst periods, in resolute

DEMOS

37

and indissoluble accord. Neither the short-comings of
Ministers and governments, nor military mistakes and
disasters, nor the long weariness of years of slaughter, nor
disappointment, nor just ground of complaint, nor loss,
nor hardship had led to any falling away among those who
had plighted their faith. They had endured together to the
end. But now the end had come, and ever3rwhere men drew
breath and looked around them.

Since May 1915 Coalition Governments had been in
power, but the second Coalition of 1916 differed significantly
from its predecessors. The Conservative Party although
in a large minority in the House of Commons had obtained
an obvious and decisive ascendancy. Mr. Lloyd George had
secured as partners in his Govermnent the official representa-
tives of the Labour Party ; but the leaders of the Liberal
Party as well as a substantial majority of its members were
under Mr. Asquith’s control. The Liberal Ministers and
members who adhered to the new Prime Minister might
speak in the name of their individual constituencies but
could not claim official and collective party status. No one
had troubled about this during the war. Whatever differ-
ences had appeared in the House of Commons had been due
not to party feehngs but to divergent personal loyalties and
for the rest were solely concerned with the question of how
best to procure victory. From the hour of the Armistice,
however, the situation in the Liberal Party became a matter
of practical and urgent concern to the Prime Minister. He
had wandered far from the orthodox paths of Liberalism ;
he was known to be the main author of conscription ; he
had raised his hand with noticeable animus against the
conscientious objector ; he had not hesitated in the public
need to violate and trample upon Liberal sentiments ; he
had driven his old chief, the honoured leader of the Liberal
Party, and nearly all his former colleagues from office and
from all share in the conduct of the war. They naturally
took a different view of his personal contribution to the
victory from that of the cheering multitude. They were
hostile, competent, extrraiely well informed and in posses-
sion of the party machine. The one significant division
which had been taken against Mr. Lloyd George in war

The

Revival
of Party
Politics.

Mr. Lloyd
George
and the
Liberals.

38 THE WORLD CRISIS: the aftermath

time had revealed one hundred and nine inveterate party
opponents among the Libeial Members compared to seventy-
three Parliamentary adherents. It was moreover certain
that as soon as peace was signed the Labour Ministers would
be formally recalled by the Labom Party from further
participation in the Government, There remained the
Conservative Party, loyal and determined in their support
of the Prime Minister, a very strong integral organization,
but entirely separate from him. Thus from the moment
party politics began to rise again upon the threshold of
political consciousness, Mr. Lloyd George’s position at the
height of his fame became one of singular insecurity.

For the moment, however, all eyes were turned upon
the approaching Peace Conference and historical pictures
of the Congress of Vienna rose in the political mind. Paris
became the centre of the world, and thither as soon as
the urgent domestic business could be dispatched all the
leading statesmen of all the victorious countries were
intending or eager to repair. The choice before Mr. Lloyd
George was not free from embarrassment. His right-hand
colleague must obviously be the Conservative leader, Mr.
Bonar Law. Mr. Barnes must represent Labour, The limit
provisionally imposed upon national delegations for the
sake of convenience was three, and it was already complete.
But two personages, very different in character and methods,
and each with much to give or to withhold, had also to be
considered. The first was Lord Northcliffe who, armed
with The Times in one hand and the ubiquitous Daily Mail
in the other, judged himself at least the equal of any political
leader and appeared prepared to assert his claims or resent
their disregard with a directness scarcely open to a states-
man. A general election was imminent, and the wise and
helpful behaviour of these great newspapers, obedient as
they were to the orders of their proprietor, seemed to the
Prime Minister a serious factor. The appointment of Lord
Northdiffe as a principal peace delegate over the heads of
Mr. Balfour, the Foreign Secretary and all the Prime
Ministers of the British Empire was not, however, to be
conceded.

The remaining figure was the leader of the Liberal

DEMOS

39

Party. Mr. Asquith both at the moment and after his fall The Peace
from power had steadily refused to contemplate serving
under or even with Mr. Lloyd George ; and he and his Delegate*,
friends had been accustomed to treat any suggestion of that
kind as highly offensive. Nevertheless, in the weeks which
immediately followed the victory, it was indicated that he
would not be unwilling to join as the head of his party in
the national making of a peace. Such a development woiffd
in many ways have strengthened the .Prime Minister’s
position. The peace negotiations must last for many
months and the close co-operation between the Prime
Minister and the Liberal leader could scarcely have failed
to heal the breach between them. Mr. Asquith’s own
qualities would also have been of inestimable service at
the Conference. On the other hand, his inclusion would
still further have angered Lord Northcliffe. Weighing all
these somewhat ill-assorted considerations, Mr. Lloyd George
decided not to increase the size of the delegation beyond
the limits already agreed upon with the other Powers.

I have no doubt that from his own point of view his
decision was a mistake. He had no real knowledge of
the Conservative Party ; he must soon expect to lose the
Labour Ministers ; and here at hand was the opportunity
of at once making amends to the chief to whom he had owed
so much, and of reuniting the Liberal forces with which
alone he could work contentedly in times of peace. But
far above aU personal and political considerations the
association of all parties in the peace treaty was an object
of national importance, and no one was more fitted than
Mr. Asquith to enrich the councils of the Allies. We should
have had a more august delegation, a better treaty and a
more friendly atmosphere at home.

While these delicate issues remained unsettled, except in
his own mind, the Prime Minister resolved upon an imme-
diate appeal to the country. He was armed with victory,
complete, absolute, tremendous ; victory beyond the dreams
of the most ardent, the most resolute, the most exacting.

The whole nation was eager to acclaim ‘ the pilot who
weathered the storm.’ Was it wonderful that that pilot
should turn from aggrieved and resentful associates of former

40

THE WORLD CRISIS : the aftermath

The General
Election.

days who sourly awaited the hour of peace to caU him to
account, and from Conservatives with whom he had no
real S5unpathy, to the vast electorate who sought only to
testify their gratitude by their votes ?

To this Election I was a consulted and consenting party.
I thought we had need of all the strength we could get
to face the problems of bringing home and disbanding our
armies which then numbered at home and abroad nearly
four million men, of reconstructing our industry, and making
the treaty of peace. Moreover, I had in the stress of war
resumed intimate contact with the Conservative Party
and with the friends of my youth. Having seen so many
implacable party quarrels swept away by the flood, I was
in no mind to go back and look for them. The idea of
methodically fishing up and revitalizing all the old pre-war
party controversies, and of fabricating disagreements even
where none existed, was absurd and abhorrent. I therefore
swam with the stream. If I had taken the opposite course
it would not have made the slightest difference to the event.
But candour compels acknowledgment of this measure of
responsibility.

On constitutional grounds the case was overwhelming.
The Parliament, elected for five, had lasted for eight years.
The electorate was increased from eight to twenty millions
by a newly passed Reform Bill. The people and the
soldiers who had stubbornly maintained the war, had a
light to a decision upon the use to be made of the victory.
But the Election at once raised the party issue in its
crudest form. The Conservatives had been for thirteen
years in a minority in the House of Commons. They were
in a minority of about loo in the Parliament now to
be dissolved. On the other hand, they were sure that
their hour had come. They believed that the events and
passions of the war had been withering in their effects
upon Liberal principles and ideals ;• they held that these
had been stultified or proved visionary by all that had
occurred ; they knew that the quarrels between Mr. Lloyd
George and Mr. Asquith had split the LibeTal Party from
end to end ; and finally they knew that in the personal
prestige of the Prime Minister they had an overwhelming

DEMOS

41

advantage. How then could they be asked to make an agree-
ment to safeguard aU Liberal seats ? To do so was not only
to condemn themselves to a minority in the new Parliament
but to make the whole Election a farce. Conservative
candidates were in the field throughout the constituencies.
Evidently a hard line must be drawn through the midst of
those who had in the main shared the efforts and the sorrows
of the terrible years, and the decision to have an election
inevitably involved the drawing of this line. Where then
should it be drawn ? The test adopted for sitting Members
was their vote in April in the division on General Maurice's
allegations. AU who had followed Mr. Asquith on that
occasion were considered opponents. Translated into the
rough methods of electioneering this meant that even if
such a Liberal Member or candidate had fought in the war,
or been wounded, or lost his son, or two sons, or his brother,
or had throughout in every way sustained loyally the
national cause, he must be ruled out of any share in the
victory, or even be accused of having impeded it. Letters
were written by Mr. Lloyd George and Mr. Bonar Law,
afterwards described in the jargon of war-time rationing as
' coupons,’ to the avowed supporters of the Coalition.
These induded 158 Liberal Members and candidates who
followed Mr. Lloyd George and were now described as
National Liberals. The rest were attacked with vigour.
All these consequences were inherent in the original decision
to hold an election at this moment, and judgment need
only be given upon the main issue.

But when the Election came it woefuUy cheapened
Britain. The Prime Minister and his principal colleagues
were astonished and to some extent overborne by the
passions they encountered in the constituencies. The
brave people whom nothing had daunted had suf-
fered too much. Their unpent feelings were lashed by
the popular press into fury. The crippled and mutilated
soldiers darkened the streets. The returned prisoners
told the hard tale of bonds and privation. Every cottage
had its empty chair. Hatred of the beaten foe, thirst
for his just punishment, rushed up from the heart of
deeply injured millions. Those that had done the least

The Hard
Line.

42

THE WORLD CRISIS : the aftermath

The

National

Temper.

in the conflict were as might be expected the foremost in
detailing the penalties of the vanquished. A police report
thrust under my eye at this time said : — ‘ The feelings of
all classes are the same. Even those who a few weeks
ago were agitating for peace, now say, " The Germans
should pay every penny of the damage even if it takes
them a thousand years.” ’ In my own constituency of
Dundee, respectable, orthodox, life-long Liberals demanded
the sternest punishment for the broken enemy. All over
the country the most bitter were the women, of whom seven
millions were for the first time to vote. In this uprush and
turmoil state policy and national dignity were speedily
engulfed.

Three demands rose immediate and clangorous from the
masses of the people, viz. to hang the Kaiser ; to abolish
conscription ; and to make the Germans pay the uttermost
farthing.

Upon conscription the Prime Minister and the War
Cabinet endeavoured at first to practise considerable reserve.
With the lesson before our eyes of what we had suffered
through not having a national army, it seemed impru-
dent in the last degree to cast away the weapon only
just created at measureless cost, and to re-erect all those
barriers against obligatory service which had been tardily
and with difficulty overthrown. The idea of preserving a
national militia on something like the Swiss system was
certainly in the mind of the Government ; but contact
with the constituencies swept it out of existence before it
was even mooted. Everywhere the cry was for the abolition
of all compulsion, and everywhere candidates yielded readily
to the popular wish. The Cabinet who had not committed
themselves in any positive manner hastened to bury and
forget the dangerous convictions with which they had toyed.
Before the Election was a week old the people hafi settled
that Britain should go back to the small professional army
with which she had entered the war.

The demand to hang the Kaiser found great favour with
the press and was voiced by Ministers. It was first raised
in official circles by Lord Curzon i a piquant conjunction
recalling Wilde’s description of fox-hunting, ‘ The inexpress-

DEMOS

43

ible in pursuit of the uneatable.’ But unquestionably it also ' Hang the

ISO r ^

arose spontaneously from the great masses. For four years
the Kaiser had been pilloried by every form of propaganda
as the man whose criminal ambition and wicked folly had
loosed the awful flood of misery upon the world. He was
the man responsible for all the slaughter. Why should he
not be punished for it ? Why should the humble soldier
who fell asleep through exhaustion at his post, or who broken
with wounds and long service turned from the fighting line,
be put to death, and this pampered miscreant who had
darkened every home be allowed to scuttle off in wealth
and luxury? We had armies; we had fleets; we had
Allies ; the arm of Britain was long, it could find him wher-
ever he was and execute upon his person the justice of an
outraged world. Quoth — ^in pubhc speech — ^Mr. Barnes the
official representative of the Labour Party in the War
Cabinet. ‘ . . . The Kaiser has been mentioned. . . .

I am for hanging the Kaiser.’

The Prime Minister was from the first singularly affected
by these opinions. He spoke with the utmost vehemence
on both occasions when the topic was discussed in the
Imperial War Cabinet. Not only at the Election but
throughout the Peace Conference he showed himself ready
to make persevering efforts to procure the surrender of
the Emperor and to put him on trial for his life. Person-
ally, I was not convinced that the responsibility of princes
for acts of state could be dealt with in this way. It
seemed that to hang the Kaiser was the best way to restore
at once his dignity and his dynasty. The popular wish
did not in its initial form apparently contemplate a trial.
It was evident however that the lawyers would have to
have their say, both on the validity of the proceedings and
on the personal accountability, of the accused. This also
opened up a vista both lengthy and obscmre.

I find that when my opinion was given officially (Novem-
ber 20), I xnged circumspection. ‘ On the basis of Justice
and Law, it would be difficult to say that the ex-Kaiser’s
guilt was greater than many of his advisers, or greater than
that of the Parliament of the nation which had supported
him in maldng war. It might well be that after an indict-

44

THE WORLD CRISIS : the aftermath

• Make ment had been laid against the ex-Kaiser, it would be found
them Pay.’ could not be sustained, and a serious impasse would

be created.'

In the face however of the earnest and deep-seated demand
from all classes and all parties in the city of Dundee that the
Kaiser should be hanged, I was constrained to support
his being brought to trial. I descanted upon the funda-
mental principles of British justice, that every man no
matter how vile his crimes and obvious his guilt was
entitled to a trial, and of course to a fair trial. We must
not descend to his level by omitting this usual feature in
the conviction and punishment of crime. This argument
was accepted, though without much enthusiasm, as solid
and vaUd. The Liberals drew a difference against the
Coalitionists on the question of the Kaiser’s punishment.
He was, it appears from the Daily News, only to be ‘ incar-
ceratedunderthe same conditions as any reprieved murderer. ’
But then they hastened to explain that this was really ‘ a
harder penalty than execution.’ These contortions were
not successful from any point of view.

But the crux of the whole Election was the German
indemnity. ‘ Hang the Kaiser ' was a matter of sentiment,
but ‘ make them pay ’ involved facts and figures. The
first question was — ^How much could they pay ? No
General Election, no popular demand, no Ministerial promises
could settle this. It was easy to sequestrate or surcharge aU
German property abroad and to require the surrender of all
gold in German hands. But apart from this, payment from
one country to another can only be made in goods or services.
These goods or services may be rendered directly to the
creditor coimtry or they may be rendered to third parties
who pass them on to their destination by roundabout
routes- and in a different foimT Nothing however alters
or can alter the simple nature of the transaction. Something
that a German has made must be carried out of his country
in a ship, or in a train, or in a cart, and must be accepted
directly or indirectly in pa3mient of his debt. Now the
amount of goods which the Germans could make in a year
exceeded the amount that could physically be carried out
of the country by any vehicles then in existence, and this

DEMOS

45

reduced amount again far exceeded what other countries,
including the creditor countries, wished to receive. For
instance, the Germans could and would readily have set to
work to rebuild all the ships their submarines had sunk —
but what was to happen to British shipbuilding if they did ?
They could no doubt make every form of manufactured
article ; but surely we had not fought the war in order to
have all our native industries ruined by state-fostered dump-
ing on a gigantic scale ! They could export coal for nothing,
and have done so regularly since, but the advantage to the
British coal-fields has not been obvious. They could export
to neutral countries only so far as they could tempt these
countries with their wares, and the resulting credits would
be transferable to the Allies in the form of other goods only
by degrees as opportunity ofiered,

TTiere remained the method of service. The Germans
could, for instance, have manned all the merchant ships
and carried everybody’s goods at German expense till further
notice, thus gaining the complete carrying trade of the world ;
or the Germans could go in scores of thousands into France
and into Belgium and build up by their labour the houses
that had been destroyed and recultivate the devastated
areas. As, however, they had just been turned out of these
very places at so much expense, and had left some impleasant
memories behind them, the inhabitants of these regions
having at last got back to the ruins of their homes were not
at all anxious to see the German face or hear the German
tongue again so soon. Something might be done in all of
these directions, but it was evident to anyone with the
slightest comprehension of economic facts that the limits
would very soon be reached and could not possibly be
exceeded. They were limits not removable by ignorance
and passion.

The bill for the damage was many months later scaled
down to between six and seven thousand millions sterling.
This figure was not known at the Election. Had it been
known, it would have been scouted. Germany could, by
lowering the wages and lengthening the hours of labour, and
by limiting the profits of capital, undoubtedly pay very large
sums ; but then by this same process she would render

Methods of
Payment.

How

Much?

46 THE WORLD CRISIS : the aftermath

herself the overmastering, if profitless, competitor in every
market. Even so the result would be but a fraction of the
damage done. In olden times a conquering army carried
off in its own way all movable property in the territory
which it ravaged, and in antiquity the conquerors drove
along with them in a state of slavery all the men and
women who were likely to be of use. Sometimes also a
tribute was exacted for many years or in perpetuity. But
what was now expected was on a scale utterly beyond these
comparatively simple procedures. The payment of even
the most moderate indemnity on a modem scale required
the revival and maintenance of a superlative state of scien-
tific production in Germany, and of the highest commercial
activity. Yet those who clamoured for enormous figures
were also the foremost in proposing every method by which
German trade and industry could be crippled.

These arguments were unseasonable. Their mere state-
ment exposed the speaker to a charge of being pro-German
or at best a weakling. Not only the ordinary electors, but
experts of aU kinds, financial and economic, as well as busi-
ness men and politicians, showed themselves unconsciously
or wilfully blind to the stubborn facts.

No one understood the question better than the Prime
Minister. His first statement to his colleagues on the
subject (November 26) was a forceful epitome of the argu-
ments recited above. A Committee of Treasury officials,^
equipped with the profound knowledge of their Department,
had already reported that spread over thirty years a total
present value of £ 2,000 millions might be a reasonable and
practicable sum for Germany to pay. This unwelcome
figure was sharply challenged, and a new Committee of
the Imperial War Cabinet was set up to test it. I was
present with other Ministerial officials at the meeting
where these statements were made. I held fi rmly to the
Treasury estimate when I faced the electors of Dundee.
I dressed it up as well as possible. ‘ We will make them
pay an indemnity.' (Cheers.) ‘We will make them pay
a large indemnity.’ (Cheers.) ‘ They exacted from France
a large indemnity in 1870. We will make them pay ten
^ Headed by Mr. Keynes.

DEMOS

47

times as much.’ (Prolonged cheers.) ‘ (200 millions X 10
= 2,000 millions) Everybody was delighted. It was only
the next day that the figures began to be scrutinized. Then
came a hectoring telegram from an important Chamber of
Commerce, ‘ Haven’t you left out a nought in your indemnity
figures ? ’ The local papers gibbered with strident claims.
Twelve thousand millions, fifteen thousand millions were
ever5rwhere on the lips of men and women who the day
before had been quite happy with two thousand inillions, and
were not anyhow going to get either for themselves. How-
ever, adding under daily pressure ‘ Of course if we can get
more, aU the better,’ I stuck to my two thousand milli ons,
and this figure has not yet been impugned. But aU over
the country the most insensate figures were used. One
Minister, reproached with lack of vim, went so fax as to say
‘ We would squeeze the German lemon tiU the pips squeaked,’
and many private candidates with greater freedom and even
less responsibility let themselves go wherever the wind
might carry them.

I cannot pretend not to have been influenced by the
electoral currents so far as verbiage was concerned. But
in order to establish my credentials for the further dis-
cussion of these issues, I print two letters to influential
constituents which I wrote during the election.

November 22nd, 1918.

I am in sympathy with your feeling that we must not
allow ourselves to be deprived of the full fruits of victory
But do you think that you are quite right in sa3dng that
we ought to impose upon Germany the same sort of terms
as they imposed upon France in 1871 ? Surely the forcible
annexation by Germany of Alsace-Lorraine against the
will of the people who lived there and who wanted to stay
with France was one of the great causes at work in Europe
all these years to bring about the present catastrophe.
If we were now to take provinces of Germany inhabited by
Germans who wished to stay with Germany, and held them
down under a foreign government, should we not nm the
risk of committing the same crime as the Germans com-
mitted in 1871 and bringing about the same train of evil
consequences ?

Again with regard to payment for the war, I am entirely
in favour of making the Germans pay all they can. But

Letters to
Constituents.

48 THE WORLD CRISIS : the aftermath

Letters to payment can only be made in one of three ways. (A) Gold
Constituents securities. This would only be a drop in the bucket.

(B) Forced labour, i.e. Germans coming to work for us and
our Allies in a state of servitude. This woiold take the
bread out of the mouths of our own people, and, besides,
we would rather have these Germans’ room than their
company. Or (C) Pa3mient in goods. We must be careful
not to demand pa5ment in goods from the Germans which
would undercut our own trade here. Otherwise we shall
be creating by Treaty that very dumping against which
our own manufacturers are so much up in arms. The
Allies have demanded from the Germans Reparation, i.e.
pa3ment by them for the damage which they have done.
This may easily amount to more than £2,000,000,000.
They have not asked them to pay for the expenses of the
war which I see have been calculated at £40,000,000,000.
The reason why they have not done so is because they
believed that it was physically impossible for them to do
so, and that a Treaty ^awn up on that basis would be found
afterwards to be valueless.

Speaking more generally, I think that the Govenunent
which has conducted this country to this astounding triumph
and has compelled Germany to accept the hard conditions of
the armistice, is entitled to claim some measure of confidence,
and that the Allied Statesmen who are now going to meet
together should be trusted, with their superior knowledge
and experience, which cannot be shared by everybody, to
do their best for the general future of the world. We must
be very careful to stand firm upon those great principles for
which we have fought and in whose name we have conquered.

And again :

December <^th, 1918.

If the peace which we are going to make in Europe should
lead, as I trust it will, to the liberation of captive nation-
alities, to a reunion of those branches of the same family
which have been long arbitrarily divided, and to the drawing
of frontiers in broad correspondence with the ethnic masses,
it will remove for ever most of the causes of possible wars.
And with the removal of the Cause, the Symptom, i.e.
armaments, will gradually and naturally subside.

I cannot but think we have much to be thankful for,
and more still to hope for in the future.

With regard to Russia, you have only to seek the truth
to be assured of the awful forms of anti-democratic tyranny
which prevail there, and the appalling social and economic
reactions and degenerations which are in progress. The

DEMOS

49

only sure foundation for a State is a Government freely
elected by millions of people, and as many millions as
possible. It is fatal to swerve from that conception.

Mr. Lloyd George, having committed himself to the elec-
toral scrimmage, played the part which circumstances
enjoined. In his august station, national and European,
he ought never to have been called upon to speak night
after night upon the platform. The hardest test of aU is
to stand against the current of millions of rejoicing and
admiring supporters. He ought to have been more smre of
himself at this time, and of the greatness of his work and
situation. He could well have afforded, as it turned out,
to speak words of sober restraint and of magnanimous calm.
More than this, it would only have been prudent to pour
some cold water upon inordinate hopes and claims, and have
on record a few sour statements, which however resented at
the time, would have been precious afterwards. He tried
his best. His speeches soon fell far behind the popular
demand. On two occasions, one a great meeting of women,
he was almost howled down. In the hot squalid rush of
the event he endeavoured to give satisfaction to mob-feeling
and press chorus by using language which was in harmony
with the prevailingsentiment, but which contained in every
passage some guarding phrase, some qualification, which
afterwards would leave statesmandiip unchained.

On the actual figure of the indemnity the Prime Minister
was studiously vague. The Committee of the Imperial War
Cabinet upon the German capacity to pay reported during
the Election. Largely on the evidence of Lord Cunliffe of
all people, the Governor of the Bank of England, they lent
countenance to a maximum annual payment by ‘ the enemy
Powers ’ (not Germany alone) of no less than £1,200 millions,
i.e. the interest on £24,000 millions capital. Mr. Lloyd
George had this staggering report before him when he made
his Bristol speech. He did not accept it ; and in spite of
the public passion on the one hand and the Governor’s
opinion on the other, he delivered a restrained and cautious
statement. Germany must be made to pay every penny,
and a Commission would be set up to see how much she
could pay. There was however an overflow, and the

D

The Prime
Minister and
the

Indemnity.

50

THE WORLD CRISIS : the aftermath

The Result
of the
Election.

weary Prime Minister flung out this sentence to a
rapturous crowd. ' They must pay to the uttermost
farthing and we shall search their pockets for it.’ This
dominated all his qualifications. ‘ Search their pockets ’
became the slogan of the hour.

The actual decision which the Prime Minister recom-
mended to, and obtained from, the Imperial War Cabinet
will stand the test of time. ‘ To endeavour to secure from
Germany the greatest possible indemnity she can pay,
consistently with the economic well-being of the British
Empire and the peace of the world, and without involving
an Army of Occupation in Germany for its collection.’

Apart from these issues the Election resolved itself into
an overwhelming vote of confidence in Mr. Lloyd George.
Nearly every candidate who obtained his benediction was
returned ; nearly every one who did not seek or receive it
was rejected. When the results, which were delayed for a
month in order to collect the military votes, were announced,
barely ninety of his Liberal and Labour opponents found
seats in the House of Commons. Simultaneously the Irish
Elections swept away the Nationalist Parliamentary Party
and, as the Sinn Fein Members boycotted Westminster, the
Irish representation in the Imperial Parliament disappeared.

The Prime Minister found himself, with a five-years'
constitutional tenure before him, at the head of a majority,
elected mainly upon his personal prestige and popularity,
comprising nearly five-sixths of the whole House. But for
this he had paid a heavy price. The Liberal Party was
mortally injured. Those who opposed him were blotted out.
The 136 Liberal members who supported him were cut from
their party basis and in nearly every case were dependent
upon Conservative support, and Mr. Lloyd George was
thus sustained only by his transient personal prestige. So
long as this lasted his position and authority were un-
challengeable, but how long would it last ?

Moreover, in the wider sphere of Emope the blatancies
of electioneering had robbed Britain in an appreciable
degree of her dignity. The national bearing, faultless in
the years of trial — ^loyal, cool, temperate, humane amidst
terrors and reverses — had experienced quite a vulgar upset.

DEMOS

51

It was not from the majesty of the battlefield nor the
solemnity of the council chamber, but from the scrimmage
of the hustings, that the British Plenipotentiaries proceeded
to the Peace Conference. On the other side of the account
there was, however, a solid and practical asset. We had
a new Parliament, with a great majority, ready to sustain
the Government in the labours and perplexities which lay
before it.

Its After'
effects.

CHAPTER III

The

Formation
of the
New

Government.

DEMOBILIZATION

‘ All tJie world over, nursing their scars
Sit the old fighting men, broke in the wars ;

All the world over, surly and grim
Mocking the lilt of the conqueror’s hymn.’

— Rudyard Kipling.

The Formation of the New Government — ^At the War Office —
Serious Situation in the Army — ^The Remedy — ^The New
System — A. Dangerous Interlude — Imponderabilia — ^The Calais
Mutiny — On the Horse Guards’ Parade — ^The Young Guard —
Conduct of the ex-Soldiers — ^The Blockade — ^Lord Plumer’s
Despatch — ^The Territorial Army — ^The German Prisoners.

T he new Administration was formed on the morrow of
the Election results. I had obtained a promise be-
forehand from the Prime Minister that he would restore the
old system of Cabinet Government at the earliest moment
possible. This was not immediately achieved. The five
members of the War Cabinet, who were alone responsible
for all policy and to whose direction the Secretaries of State
and other Ministers were in theory amenable, appeared
reluctant to distribute their powers around a wider circle.
It was indeed nearly a year before the normal con-
stitutional practice was resumed. The principle was,
however, conceded from the outset.

The Prime Minister reconstructed his Government with
masterful despatch. At the end of a conversation on
various topics he said to me in so many words, ' Make
up your mind whether you would like to go to the War
Office or the Admiralty, and let me know by to-morrow.
You can take the Air with you in either case ; I am not
going to keep it as a separate department.’

I spent the night at Blenheim, and from there accepted

52

DEMOBILIZATION

53

the Admiralty together with the Air Ministry ; but when I
reached London the next afternoon I found the position
had changed. The temper of the Army and the problem of
demobilization caused increasing anxiety. I could not
refuse the Prime Minister’s wish that I should go to
the War Office. The new Ministry was announced on
January lo, and I quitted the Ministry of Munitions and
became responsible for the War Office on the 15th. I was
immediately confronted with conditions of critical emer-
gency.

In the summer of 1917 a draft scheme of demobilization
had been prepared partly in the War Office but mainly in
accordance with civilian opinion. The prime object was
naturally the re-starting of Industry, and questions of the
feelings and discipline of the troops themselves were not
accorded proper weight. In Jime, 1917, the scheme had
been referred to General Headquarters and it was immedi-
ately criticized by Sir Douglas Haig as ‘ most objectionable
and prejudicial to discipline.’ The views of the Civil
Departments were however generally sustained by the War
Cabinet. The scheme lay in the backgrotmd during the
prolonged crisis of the War, and at the Armistice suddenly
became vigorously operative.

According to the logic of this scheme the first men to be
released were what were called ‘ key men,' i.e. men who
were asked for by employers at home to restart the in-
dustries. These ' key men ’ were therefore being picked
out by scores of thousands from all the units of the
army and hurried back across the Channel. But these ' key
men ’ who were to be the first to come home had been in
many ca^es the last to go out. The important parts they
played in war industry had retained them at home until
the needs of the Army became desperate after March 21,
1918. In practice also the system lent itself to inevitable
abuse. Those who were so fortunate as to be able to
present letters and telegrams from employers at home oflier-
ing them employment and claiming their services were
immediately released. Influence was not slow to procure
such credentials. Several thousands while on leave at
home were actually excused from returning to the Army.

At the
War OfiSLce.

54

THE WORLD CRISIS : the aftermath

A Serious The ordinary soldier without these advantages saw his
lately joined comrade hurrying home to take his job, or
somebody’s job, in England, while he, after years of perils
and privations on a soldier’s pay, wounded and sent back to
the carnage three or sometimes four times, was to be left
until all the plums at home had been picked up and every
vacancy filled. The fighting man has a grim sense of j ustice,
which it is dangerous to affront. As the result the dis-
cipline of every single separate unit throughout the whole
of oxxr Army in all the theatres of war was swiftly and simul-
taneously rotted and undermined. For nearly two months
this process had continued, and it had become intolerable
to the fighting troops.

The study I gave to the matter in the five days which
intervened between the acceptance and the assumption
of my new of&ce left me in no doubt upon the course to
pursue. Mutinies and disorders had already taken place on
both sides of the Channel. In particular a mutiny had
occurred at Folkestone on January 3. Sir Eric Geddes had
newly succeeded General Smuts in dealing with the re-
starting of Industry. A few days before I entered the
War Office the approaches to the building were blocked by
lorry-loads of insubordinate Army Service Corps men who
had seized these vehicles and driven them up to London.
On each lorry was painted the legend borrowed from
a Daily Express cartoon, ‘ Get on or Get out Geddes.’
A wave of intense impatience and resentment accom-
panied by serious breaches of discipline spread across
the splendid armies which had never faltered in the direst
stress of war.

If the cause was plain, so was the remedy. My only
difficulty was to procure the assent of others; my only
apprehension, whether we were not already too late. I had
before taking up my new duties insisted that the Secretary
of State for War should have the final word against all
civilian departments in matters affecting the discipline of
the troops. In the situation which had now developed this
could hardly be denied, and was readily conceded,

I propoimded forthwith the following policy —

First : Soldiers should as a general rule only be released

DEMOBILIZATION

55

from the front in accordance with their length of service
and age. Those who had served the longest at the front
were to be the first to be demobilized, and any man with
three wound stripes or more was to be discharged forth-
with. Everyone must take his turn in accordance with
this order.

Secondly : The pay of the Army must be immediately
increased to more than double the war rate, in order to lessen
the gap between the rewards of military and civilian
employment.

Thirdly ; In order, whilst stm maintaining the necessary
forces in the field, to release the men who had fought in
as large numbers and as quickly as possible, the 80,000
young lads who had been trained but had not quitted our
shores, must be retained compulsorily for a period of two
years and sent abroad.

Ardently supported by Sir Douglas Haig, whom I sum-
moned from France, and amid the continued and growing
demoralization of the Army, I obtained the necessary
authority from the War Cabinet. But this took some time.
The Prime Minister was in France. Mr. Bonar Law,
though exercising a wide measure of discretion, referred
important matters to him. The War Cabinet were per-
turbed at the idea of presenting a new Conscription Bill to
Parliament after the war was over, and after the electorate
had shown such vehement repugnance to the idea. The
Chancellor of the Exchequer was rightly concerned at the
expenditure involved in the heavy cost of the increased
pay to the Services. There was no time for ceremony.
After consultation with the Adjutant-General, Sir
George Macdonogh, an officer of brilliant attainments, I
decided to take him over to Paris with me on the evening
of January 23, to obtain the Prime Minister’s approval to
the scheme which had been proposed. We breakfasted with
Mr. Lloyd George on the morning of the a4th, accompanied
him to the Peace Conference at the Quai d'Orsay, returned
with him to lunch and discussed the whole position. I
instructed the Adjutant-General to draw up two Army
Orders embod37ing the decisions which had been obtained
from the Prime Minister, and to submit them to me at

The

Remedy.

The New
System.

56 THE WORLD CRISIS : the aftermath

6 p.m. Having approved these orders I directed the Adju-
tant-General to return to London by the midnight train
and to get the Army Ordets issued, with such departmental
additions and Army Council Instructions as might be needed
with the least possible delay. This he did, and on January
29 Army Order 54 (Extra Remuneration to those retained
on Military Service) and Army Order 55 (Armies of Occupa-
tion) were issued. The title of the first of these Army
Orders explains itself. The second announced the Govern-
ment’s intention about the maintenance of Armies of
Occupation pending the reconstruction of the Regular
Forces, and laid down the rules under which Officers and
other Ranks would be retained or demobilized. Corre-
sponding Royal Warrants were issued concurrently.

I wrote an explanation for the Armies of the whole posi-
tion in language which they would understand and it was
published officially at the same time as the Army Orders.
It covered the whole field of War Office policy in relation
to the troops during the year 1919. It was strictly and
unchangingly carried into effect.

The Armies of Occupation.

Explanatory Note hy the Secretary of State for War.

1. On November ii, when the Armistice was signed,
there were about 3,500,000 Imperial British officers and
soldiers on the pay and ration strength of the British Army.
During the two months that have passed since then, rather
more than three-quarters of a million have been demobilized
or discharged. The system of demobilization which has
been adopted aims at reviving national industiy by bringing
the men home in the order of urgency according to trades.
There is no doubt that this is the wisest course, and it will
continue to be followed in the large majority of cases. The
time has now come, however, when military needs must be
considered as well as industrial needs.

2. Unless we are to be defrauded of the fruits of victory
and, without considering our AUies, to throw away all that
we have won with so much cost and trouble, we must pro-
vide for a good many months to come Armies of Occupation
for the enemy’s territory. These armies must be strong
enough to exact from the Germans, Turks and others the
just terms which the Allies demand, and we must bear our
share with France, America and Italy in providing them.

DEMOBILIZATION

57

The better trained and disciplined these armies are, the The New
fewer men will be needed to do the job. We have, there- System,
fore, to create, in order to wind up the war satisfactorily, a
strong, compact, contented, well-disciplined army which will
maintain the high reputation of the British Service and
make sure we are not tricked of what we have rightfully
won. It will be an Army far smaller than our present
Army. In fact, it will be about one-quarter of the great
armies we have been using in the war.

3. Our Military Commanders, who know what Marshal
Foch’s widies are, say that in their opinion not more than
900,000 men of all ranks and arms will be sufhcient to guard
our interests in this transition period. Therefore, when
this new Army has been organized, and while it is being
organized, over two and a half million men who were held to
militaiy service when the fighting stopped will be released
to their homes and to industry as fast as the trains and ships
can carry them and the Pay Ofiices settle their accounts.

In other words, out of 3,500,000 it is proposed to keep
for the present about 900,000 and release all the others as
fast as possible.

4. How ought we to choose the 900,000 who are to remain
to finish up the work ? When men are marked for release
they obviously ought to go home in the order which will
most quickly restart our industries, for otherwise they
would leave their means of livelihood in the Army and
relinquish their rations and their separation allowance only
to become unemployed in great numbers. But, when men
are kept back in the Service to form the Armies of Occupa-
tion a choice cannot be made simply on trade grounds. It
must be made on grounds which appeal broadly to a sense of
justice and fair play. Length of service, age and woimds
must be the main considerations entitling a man to release.

The new Army will, therefore, be composed in the first
instance only from those w'ho did not enlist before January
1, 1916, who are not over 37 years of age, and have not more
than two woimd stripes. If anyone has to stay, it must be
those who are not the oldest, not those who came the earliest,
not those who have suffered the most.

5. We, therefore, take these broad rules as our main
guide. According to the best calculations which are
possible they sho^d give us about 1,300,000 men, out of
which it is intended to form the Army of 900,000. If
we find, as we shall do in all probability, that we have in
the classes chosen more men than we actually require
after dealing with a certain number of pivotal and com-
passionate cases, we shall proceed to reduce down to the

58 THE WORLD CRISIS : the aftermath

The New figure of Qoo.ooo first by reducing the age of retention to

System. ^5^ to 35, next releasing the men with two wound stripes

and then on to 34.

As the time goes on we shall not require to keep so large
an Army as goo, 000 in the field, and it will be possible to
continue making reductions on the principle of releasing the
oldest men by the years of their age. When, however, the
results of the war are finally achieved, the Divisions which
have remained to the end will be brought home as units and
make their entry into the principal cities of Great Britain
with which they are territorially associated.

Volunteers for one year’s service at a time for the Annies
of Occupation will be accepted from men who would other-
wise be entitled to release if they are physically fit and other-
wise suitable ; and young soldiers now serving will be sent
from home to take their turn and do their share. All these
will be in relief of the older men. They will enable the age
limit to be further reduced and the older men to be sent
home. In particular the 69 battalions of young soldiers of
18 years of age and upwards who are now at home will be
sent at once to help guard the Rhine Bridgeheads. They
will thus enable an equal number of men, old enough to be
their fathers, to come home, and they themselves will have
a chance to see the German provinces which are now in our
keeping and the battlefields where the British Army won
immortal fame.

6. The new Armies of Occupation will begin forming from
February i, and it is hoped that in three months they may
be completely organized. There will then be two classes of
men in khaki, viz., those who form the Armies of Occupa-
tion, and those who are to be demobilized. Everything
possible will be done to send home or disperse the two and
a half million men who are no longer required. But they
must wait their turn patiently and meanwhile do their duty
in an exemplary manner. Any of these men who are marked
for home who are guilty of any form of insubordination will,
apart from any other punishment, be put back to the bottom
of the Ust. There are no means of getting these great
numbers of men home quickly unless everyone does his duty
in the strictest possible way. It is recognized, however,
that service in the Annies of Occupation is an extra demand
which the State makes in its need upon certain classes of its
citizens. The emoluments of the Armies of Occupation, will
therefore be substantially augmented, and every man will
draw bonuses from the date of his posting to these Armies
with arrears from February 1.

DEMOBILIZATION

59

9. The Armies of Occupation will be as follows : —

Home Army.

Army of the Rhine,

Army of the Middle East.

Detachment of the Far North.
Garrisons of the Crown Colonies
and India.

A Dangerous
Interlude.

12. The above arrangements seem to be the best that can
be devised for the year 1919. During this year, however,
we must remake the Old British Regular Army so as to
provide on a voluntary basis the Overseas Garrisons of India,
Egj^t, the Mediterranean Fortresses and other foreign
stations.

It is believed that volunteering for the Regular Army will
improve, as soon as the great mass of those who volunteered
for the war against Germany in the early days have come
back to the freedom of civil life, and have had a chance to
look round. It is upon the steady rebuilding of this Army
that the relief of the Territorial battalions in India and
various detachments in distant theatres now depends.
Every effort wiU therefore be made to hasten its formation
both by recruiting and by re-engagement,

13. It is not necessary at this stage to settle the condi-
tions on which the National Home Defence Army for after
the War will be formed. There are many more urgent
problems which should be solved first.

14. The entire scheme of the War Ofl&ce for dealing with
the many difficulties of the present situation and for safe-
guarding British interests is thus published to the Army and
the Nation at large ; it has been agreed upon between ^ the
authorities and departments concerned. The consent of
Parliament, where necessary, will be asked for at the earliest
possible moment. It remains for all ranks and all classes to
work together with the utmost comradeship and energy to
put it into force, and thereby to safeguard the best interests
of each one of us and the final victory of our cause.

But the time to prepare and decide upon these far-reach-
ing measrures and to procure the assent or submission of so
many important personages, namely fourteen days, and
the further time needed for the Annies to realize the new
decisions was a very anxious period, marked by many ugly
and dangerous episodes. Not only the armies but the peoples
were profoundly affected by the sudden cessation of the
war. The poise and balance even of Britain was deranged.
In those days the Russian revolution had not been exposed
as a mere organization of tyranny, perverse and infinitely

6o THE WORLD CRISIS : the aftermath

cruel. The events which had taken place in Russia, the
doctrines and watchwords which poured out from Moscow,
seemed to millions of people in every land to offer prospects
of moving forward into a bright new world of Brotherhood,
Equality and Science. Everywhere the subversive elements
were active ; and everywhere they found a response.
S 0 many frightful things had happened , and such tremend ous
collapses of established structures had been witnessed, the
nations had suffered so long, that a tremor, and indeed a
spasm, shook the foundations of every State.

Here in Britain we know our own people well. Millions
of men and women have been accustomed for generations
to take an active part in politics, and have felt that in
their sphere and station they were constantly deciding and
guiding the policy of their country. The political parties
with all their organizations, associations, leagues and clubs
afforded effective vehicles of popular expression. More-
over, the Constitution had itself grown up as the most
thorough and practical mechanism yet devised in the modern
world for bringing the force of public opinion to bear upon
the conduct of affairs. Well was it that we were ‘ broad
based upon the people's will’ and newly authorized by
their direct pronouncement.

Certainly there were factors which nobody could measure
and which no one had ever before seen at work. Armies of
nearly four million men had been suddenly and consciously
released from the iron discipline of war, from the inexorable
compulsions of what they believed to be a righteous cause.
All these vast numbers had been taught for years how to kill ;
how to punch a bayonet into the vital organs ; how to
smash the brains out with a mace ; how to make and throw
bombs as if they were no more than snowballs. All of them
had been through a mill of prolonged inconceivable pressures
and innumerable tearing teeth. To aU, sudden and violent
death, the woeful spectacle of shattered men and dwellings
was, either to see in others or expect and face for oneself,
the commonest incident of daily life. If these armies
formed a united resolve, if they were seduced from the
standards of duty and patriotism, there was no power
which could even have attempted to withstand them.

DEMOBILIZATION

6i

TMs was the testing time, if there ever was one, for the The Calais
renowned sagacity and political education of the British
Democracy.

In a single week more than thirty cases of insubordination
among the troops were reported from different centres.

Nearly all were repressed or appeased by the remonstrances
of their ofdcers. But in several cases considerable bodies
of men were for some days entirely out of control. The
chief offenders were the Army Service Corps in the Grove
Park and Kempton Park Mechanical Transport Depots.

Some units informed their officers that they had constituted
themselves a Soldiers’ Council and intended to march to
the nearest township and fraternize with the workmen.

Usually they were dissuaded by reasonable arguments.
Sometimes the officers cycling by a circuitous route inter-
cepted their men before the town was reached and induced
them to return to their duty. The influence of the regi-
mental officers was nearly always successful. Although the
situation was very threatening in many places, almost the
only spot where there was actual and serious rioting was at
Luton, where owing to the weakness of the civic authorities,
the Town Hall was birmt by the mob.

A regular mutiny broke out at Calais. Between the 27th
and 31st of January the Army Ordnance detachments and
the Mechanical Transport, which were the least-disciplined
part of the army, had seen least of the fighting and were
most closely associated with political Trade Unionism,
refused to obey orders. They met the Leave-Boats and
induced a large number of the returning soldiers to join
them. In twenty-four hours the ringleaders were at the
head of about three or four thousand armed men and in
complete possession of the town. All the fighting divisions
had moved on towards or into Germany, and there was no
force immediately at hand to cope with the mutineers.

The Commander-in-Chief accordingly recalled two divisions
from their forward march, and placing them under the
personal control of a most trusted and respected Army
Commander, General B3mg, directed them upon the scene
of the disorders. The soldiers of these divisions were roused
to indignation at the news that demobilization was being

62 THE WORLD CRISIS: the aftermath

On the
Horse
Guards'
Parade.

obstructed by comrades of theirs who had in no wise borne
the brunt of the fighting. By nightfall of the second day
the disaffected soldiery were encircled by a ring of bayonets
and machine guns. At daylight a converging advance
was made upon them. In front officers, unarmed, called
upon them to return to duty ; behind them deadly over-
whelming force was arrayed. Thus confronted, most of the
men drifted to the rear, but several hundreds stood their
groimd with obstinacy. A shocking explosion would have
been precipitated by a single shot ; but self-restraint and
good feeling triumphed. The ringleaders were arrested,
and the rest returned to their obedience without the shedding
of a drop of blood.

Simultaneously with this came the news of serious riots in
Glasgow and Belfast. Both these riots were fomented by
the Communists. The Army was called upon to aid the
civil power. Two^ Brigades were moved into Glasgow.
These were only second-line troops consisting of the least
efficient soldiers or young recruits. They had not, like
those at the front, been tempered in war nor had they tasted
victory. However, officers and men discharged their duty
faultlessly. Order was restored. Very few lives were lost,
and when blood flowed, it was mostly from the nose.

The last incident that I shall record came under my
personal notice. At half-past eight on the morning of Feb-
ruary 8 I was summoned urgently to the War Office. As
■ I drove thither I observed a battalion of Guards drawn up
along the Mall. I passed through the Admiralty Arch and
readied my office without remarking an3dhing else unusual.
Arrived there I received a disagreeable report : About 3,000
soldiers of many units and all arms of the service had
gathered at Victoria Station to catcb the early train for
those returning from leave. The Director of Movements had
failed to make ade<^uate arrangements for the transport, feed-
ing and housing of leave men coming in this case principally
firom the North. The poor soldiers, many of whom had
waited all night on the platform, none of whom could obtain
food or tea, felt it very hard to be going back to France
now that the fighting was over and the war was won, while
so many of their coimdes, were, as they had been told,

DEMOBILIZATION

63

snapping up the best billets in England. They had suddenly
upon some instigation resorted in a body to Whitehall, and
were now filling the Horse Guards’ Parade armed and in
a state of complete disorder. Their leader, I was informed,
was at that very moment prescribing conditions to the
Staff of the London Command in the Horse Guards building.

Sir William Robertson and General Feilding, commanding
the London District, presented themselves to me with this
account, and added that a reserve Battalion of Grenadiers
and two troops of the Household Cavalry were available
on the spot. What course were they authorized to adopt ?
I asked whether the Battalion would obey orders, and was
answered ‘ The officers believe so.’ On this I requested
the Generals to surround and make prisoners of the dis-
orderly mass. They departed immediately on this duty.

I remained in my room a prey to anxiety. A very grave
issue had arisen at the physical heart of the State. Ten
minutes passed slowly. From my windows I could see the
Life Guards on duty in Whitehall closing the gates and
doors of the archway. Then suddenly there appeared on
the roof of the Horse Guards a number of civilians, perhaps
twenty or thirty in aU, who spread themselves out in a
long black s ilh ouette and were evidently watching something
which was taking place, or about to take place, on the
Parade Ground below them. What this might be I had
no means of knowing, although I was but a hundred yards
away. Another ten minutes of tension passed and back
came the Generals in a much more cheerful mood. Every-
thing had gone off happily. The Grenadiers with fixed
bayonets had closed in upon the armed crowd ; the House-
hold Cavalry had executed an enveloping movement on the
other flank ; and the whole 3,000 men had been shepherded
and escorted under arrest to Wellington Barracks, where
they were all going to have breakfast before restuning their
journey to France. No one was hurt, very few were called
to account, and only one or two were punished and that
not seriously. A large portion of the blame lay upon the
administration which had made no change in its routine
at the railway stations since the fighting had stopped.
For years men had gone back punctually and faithfully

On the
Horse
Guards'
Parade.

The Young
Guard.

64 THE WORLD CRISIS : the aftermath

to danger and death with hardly any officers or organization
just as if they were ordinary passengers on an excursion
train, and those responsible had not realized that much
more careful arrangements were required in the mild reign
of Peace.

The result of the new policy and of its explanation to the
troops was almost instantaneous. A very few days sufficed
to set back the evil currents which had begun to flow. The
un fair trial to which our Army had been subjected was at an
end. A system of demobilization had now been instituted,
the justice of which carried conviction to the soldier’s mind.
The principle that length of service, age and wounds
counted before every other consideration and every form of
influence commanded the immediate assent of all ranks.
The increases of pay were accepted in a friendly spirit. As
for the 80,000 lads of eighteen, they were eager to see the
Rhine and set their fathers, uncles and elder brothers free
after all the hardships these had gone through. The King
reviewed a dozen of these fine young battalions in Hyde
Park before their departure, and everyone was struck
with their alert and confident bearing. Within a fortnight
of the new Proclamation the discipline of our immense
though melting armies all over the world had regained its
traditional standards.

The new House of Commons met for the first time upon
the heels of these events. It asked literally several thou-
sand questions about the details of demobilization, and
special machinery had to be set up to cope with this un-
paralleled curiosity. But the Conscription Bill was passed
by a very large majority. The Liberal and Labour Opposi-
tions, animated by a sense of detachment from respon-
sibility, fought it tooth and nail. It was lucky they were
so few, for the essential services of the State might have
been greatly obstructed, at a critical time.

Meanwhile the demobilization of the armies proceeded
on the greatest scale. For a period of nearly six months
we maintained an average rate of 10,000 men a day dis-
charged to civil life. This immense body, equal to a
whole peace-time Division, was collected daily from all
the theatres of war, disembarked, de-trained, disarmed,

DEMOBILIZATION

65

de-kitted, demobilized, paid off and discharged be- Conduct of
tween sunrise and sunset. I regard this as an enormous S-Soldiew.
feat of British organizing capacity. The armies had
grown up gradually ; men had enlisted as individuals ;
they were dispersed in great masses, and somehow or
other, at the outset, they nearly all found homes and
employment. The history books boast of the way in
which twenty or thirty thousand of Cromwell’s Ironsides
laid down the panoply of war and resorted to peaceful
occupations. But what was this compared with the noble
behaviour of nearly four million British soldiers who without
confusion or commotion of any kind — once they were treated
as they deserved — emerged themselves unostentatiously in
the mass of the nation and gathered together again the
severed threads of their former lives ? One had expected,
after all the methodically inculcated butchery and barbarism
of five years of war, that acts of murder and pillage, bru-
tality and rapine, would for some years at any rate be rife
in the land. On the contrary, such are the powers of civiliza-
tion and education, and such are the qualities of our people,
that crimes of violence actually diminished and prisons had
to be closed and sold, when four million trained and success-
ful killers, or nearly one-third of the whole manhood of
the nation, resumed their civic status.

Meanwhile, having halted for a week to allow the enemy
to retreat, the armies of the Allies had advanced into
Germany by easy marches. All the roads from France
and Belgiiim which in 1914 had carried the invaders were
now fiUed with endless columns marching in the reverse
direction. The British troops were so good-humouredly
received by the enemy population and got on so well
with them that stringent and reiterated orders against
‘ Fraternization ’ were required. By the end of November
the heads of Sir Douglas Haig’s columns had reached the
Rhine and a few days later the occupation of the Bridge
Head at Cologne was completed. In all almost a quarter
of a million men representing the British Empire actually
entered Germany and settled down in pleasant quarters

B

66

THE WORLD CRISIS : the aftermath

The

Blockade.

and rest camps where their natural friendliness and good
conduct speedily reassured the inhabitants.

But a hard story has here to be told. The Armistice
conditions had prescribed that the blockade of Germany
was to continue. At the request of the Germans a clause
had been added that ‘ The Allies and the United States
contemplate the provisioning of Germany to such an extent
as shall be found necessary.’ Nothing was done in pur-
suance of this until the second renewal of the Armistice on
January i6, 1919. In fact the blockade of Germany was
extended to the Baltic ports and was thus made more severe
than before. The food situation in Germany became grave,
and painful stories circulated of the hardship of mothers
and children. During these months very few people in
Germany, except profiteers and farmers, had enough to eat.
Even as late as May members of the German Delegation
at Versailles were sufiering from the after-efiects of want
of proper food. There was in France and to some extent
in England a deliberate refusal to face the facts.

In January, 1919, began a prolonged series of negotiations
upon the conditions under which food might be imported
into Germany. Public opinion in the Allied countries was
callous. Their leaders were overwhelmed with business.
A possible charge of “ pro-Germanism ” intimidated politi-
cians. The officials into whose hands the arrangements fell
thought they were doing their duty by haggling and
stippling. Equally bad food conditions existed in other
defeated States, for which partial provision was being made.
There was also a general shortage of food and shipping
throughout the world. But meanwhile the Germans under-
went a period of extreme stringency equal to that of a
besieged town.

It is remarkable that the sudden punch which destroyed
this hateful deadlock originated with the British Army on the
Rhine. In February the reports of military officers which
reached the War Office of the food conditions in the occupied
areas became increasingly disquieting. A note of anger
began to mingle in the dry official chronicles. I made
deUberately a rough exposure to the House of Commons on
March 3. ‘ We are enforcing the blockade with rigour, and

DEMOBILIZATION 67

Germany is very near starvation. AH the evidence I have
received from officers sent by the War Office all over Ger-
many show : first, the great privations which the German
people are suffering ; and secondly, the danger of a collapse
of the entire structure of German social and national life
under the stress of hunger and malnutrition.' Early in
March the food negotiations at Spa appeared about to break
down in glacial rigmarole. But Lord Plumer, who com-
manded the British Army of Occupation in Germany, sent
a telegram to the War Office, forwarded to the Supreme
Council, urging that food should be supplied to the suffering
population in order to prevent the spread of disorder as
well as on humanitarian grotmds. He emphasized the bad
effect produced upon the British Army by the spectacle of
suffering which surrounded them. From biTn and through
other channels we learned that the British soldiers would
certainly share their rations with the women and children
among whom they were living, and that the physical
efficiency of the troops was already being affected. Armed
with Lord Plumer’s despatch and these details, Mr. Lloyd
George took the Supreme Council by the throat. ' No one,'
he remarked, ‘ can say that General Plumer is pro-German.’
The officials were chidden, and the negotiations resumed.
The difficulties and disorganization of the world were how-
ever so great that it was not tmtil May that substantial
importations of food into Germany actually took place.
The blockade, though according to the Peace Treaty in
force until its ratification, disappeared altogether by the
middle of July. But a great opportunity had been lost. The
German people, on November ii, had not only been de-
feated in the field, they had been vanquished by world
opinion. These bitter experiences stripped their con-
querors in their eyes of all credentials except those of
force.

* * . * *

A remaining task at the War Office was to get rid

of the 250,000 German prisoners of war in British hands.
For this we had to wait for many months. The
French found it very difficult to release them. When
they thought of all the slaughter represented by their

Lord

Plumer*s

Despatch.

68 THE WORLD CRISIS; the aftermath

The German capture, and of the depleted manhood of France, they

Prisoners. themselves to let these hundreds of thou-

sands of unlucky men go home. It was like surrendering
captured cannon. But by the end of the summer the battle-
fields had all been cleared ; every toil appointed to the
prisoners had been performed. There was no longer excuse
or reason for their retention. Yet as Pharaoh found it of
old, it was hard ‘ to let the people go.’ I determined to
break this complex by direct action. The telegrams tell
the tale.

Mr. Churchill to Mr. Balfour.

August 21, 1919.

After discussing the situation about German prisoners
with General Asset, I am convinced that their repatriation
should begin immediately.

Their work is done : they are costing us more than
£30,000 a day. A fine opportunity of repatriating them is
afiorded by using the return trains wMch are bringing
back the British Divisions from the Rhine to French ports.
In addition they can proceed by march. I have therefore
given directions to prepare plans for both these methods.
The operation will begin at the earliest possible moment
and at latest by September i. May I mgently appeal to
you to set the machinery in motion at your end which will
ensure the reception of these prisoners in Germany, Eighty
per cent, of them belong to unoccupied Germany or our
own area, and less than 20 per cent, to territories tmder
Allied control. I propose to begin with the German repatri-
ations. Every day counts as every day trains are arriving
with Rhine soldiers and going back empty.

Mr. Churchill to Sir Henry Wilson.

Please see my telegram about the German prisoners
and do your utmost to facilitate immediate action. The
whole economy of this army depends upon it. We should
not hesitate to act independently of the French. Will you
conmnmicate direct with Asser, advising him when he may
begin. He could fill every train returning to the Rhine
from to-morrow onwards. 10,000 at Audricq for example
could start at once. I am counting upon sanction being
given within the next two or three days.

All went well. The French delayed no longer, and the

DEMOBILIZATION

69

process of repatriating the immense numbers of German
soldiers who were eating their hearts out in captivity, once
begun, continued without ceasing, until one more miserable
relic of the war had passed out of daily life.

The German
Prisoners.

m

CHAPTER IV 1
RUSSIA FORLORN

The

Absentee.

' Ke is no Socialist who will not sacrifice his Fatherland
for the triumfh of the Social Revolution.' — Lenin.

‘ Ich bin der Geist der stets verneint.’

' I am the Spirit that evermore denies’

— Mephistopheles in Faust.

The Absentee — 'The Nameless Beast’ — Retrospect — ^The Revolu-
tion of March, r9i7 — ^The Grand Repudiator — ^The Liberal
Statesmen — Kerensky — Savinkov — ^The Bolshevik Punch — ^The
Dictatorship — ^Peace at any Price — Brest-Litovsk — ^Bolshevik
Disillusionment — The German Advance — ^Effect of the Treaty.

F rom tte circle of panoplied and triumphant states
soon to gather from all over the world to the Peace
Conference in Paris there was one absentee.

At the beginning of the war France and Britain had
counted heavily upon Russia. Certainly the Russian effort
had been enormous. Nothing had been stinted ; everything
had been risked. The forward mobilization of the Imperial
Armies and their headlong onslaught upon Germany and
Austria may be held to have played an indispensable part in
saving France from destruction in the first two months of the
war. Thereafter in spite of disasters and slaughters on an
unimaginable scale Russia had remained a faithful and
^^lighty aUy. For nearly three years she had held on her
fronts considerably more than half of the total number
of enemy divisions, and she had lost in this struggle nearly
as many men killed as all the other allies put together.
The victory of Brusilov in 1916 had been of important
service to France and still more to Italy ; and even as late
as the summer of 1917, after the fall of the Czar, the Kerensky
Government was still attempting ofEmsives in aid of the

^ For tius and tiie next Chapter see map of Russia facing p. 102.

70

RUSSIA FORLORN

7 ?

common cause. The endurance of Russia as a prime 'Xhe
factor, imtil the United States had entered the war, ranked
second only to the defeat of the German submarines as a
final turning-point of the struggle.

But Russia had fallen by the way ; and in falling she
had changed her identity. An apparition with coimtenance
different from any yet seen on earth stood in the place of the
old Ally. We saw a state without a nation, an army with-
out a country, a religion without a God. The Government
which claimed to be the new Russia sprang from Revolution
eind was fed by Terror. It had denounced the faith of
treaties ; it had made a separate peace ; it had released
a million Germans for the final onslaught in the West.

It had declared that between itself and non-communist
society no good faith, public or private, could exist
and no engagements need be respected. It had repu-
diated alike aU that Russia owed and all that was owing
to her. Just when the worst was over, when victory was
in sight, when the fruits of measureless sacrifice were at
hand, the old Russia had been dragged down, and in her
place there ruled ‘ the nameless beast ’ so long foretold in
Russian legend. Thus the Russian people were deprived
of Victory, Honour, Freedom, Peace and Bread. Thus
there was to be no Russia in the Councils of the Allies —
only an ab57ss which still continues in human affairs.

:|c sic 4r :ie He

A retrospect is necessary to explain how this disaster
had come upon the world, and to enable the reader to
understand its consequences.

The Czar had abdicated on March 15, 1917. The Pro-
visional Government of Liberal and Radical statesmen was
almost immediately recognized by the principal Allied
Powers. The Czar was placed under arrest ; the independence
of Poland was acknowledged ; and a proclamation issued
to the Allies in favomr of the self-determination of peoples
and a durable peace. The discipline of the fleets and armies
was destroyed by the notorious Order which abolished alike
the saluting of ofl&cers and the death penalty for mflitary
offences. The Council of Soldiers and Workmen’s deputies
at Petrograd so prominent in the revolution, the parent and

72

THE WORLD CRISIS : the aftermath

The

Revolution
of March,
1917-

exemplar of all the soviets which were sprouting through-
out Russia, maintained a separate existence and policy.
It appealed to the world in favour of peace without an-
nexations or indemnities; it developed its own strength
and connections and debated and harangued on first
principles almost continuously. From the outset a diver-
gence of aim was apparent between this body and the
Provisional Government. The object of the Petrograd
Council was to undermine aU authority and discipline ;
the object of the Provisional Government was to preserve
both in new and agreeable forms. On a deadlock being
reached between the rivals, Kerensky, a moderate member
of the Council, sided with the Provisional Government and
became Minister of Justice. Meanwhile the extremists
lay in the midst of the Petrograd Council, but did
not at first dominate it. AU this was in accordance with
the regular and conventional Communist plan of fostering
aU disruptive movements, especiaUy of the Left and of
pushing them continually further until the moment for
the forcible supersession of the new government is ripe.

The Provisional Ministers strutted about the Ofi&ces and
Palaces and discharged in an atmosphere of flowery senti-
ments their administrative duties. These were serious.
AU authority had been shaken from its foundation ; the
armies melted rapidly to the rear ; the raUway carriages
were crowded to the roofs and upon the roofs with mutinous
soldiers seeking fresh centres of revolt and with deserters
trying to get home. The soldiers’ and sailors’ Councils
argued interminably over every order. The whole vast
country was in confusion and agitation. The processes of
supply, whether for the armies or for the cities, were increas-
ingly disjointed. Nothing functioned effectively and every-
thing, whether munitions or food, was either lacking or
scarce. MeanwhUe the Germans, and farther south the
Austrians and the Turks, were battering upon the creaking
and quivering fronts by every known resource of scientific
wax. The statesmen of the Allied nations affected to beUeve
that aU was for the best and that the Russian revolution
constituted a notable advantage for the common cause.

In the middle of April the Germans took a sombre decision.

RUSSIA FORLORN

73

Ludendorfi refers to it with bated breath. Full allowance Lenin,
must be made for the desperate stakes to which the Geiman
war leaders were already committed. They were in the
mood which had opened imlimited submarine warfare with
the certainty of bringing the United States into the war
against them. Upon the Western front they had from
the beginning used the most terrible means of offence
at their disposal. They had employed poison gas on the
largest scale and had invented the ‘ Flammenwerfer.’
Nevertheless it was with a sense of awe that they turned
upon Russia the most grisly of all weapons. They trans-
ported Lenin in a sealed truck like a plague bacillus from
Switzerland into Russia. Lenin arrived at Petrograd on
April i6. Who was this being in whom there resided these
dire potentialities ? Lenin was to Karl Marx what Omar
was to Mahomet. He translated faith into acts. He
devised the practical methods by which the Marxian theories
could be applied in his own time. He invented the Com-
munist plan of campaign. He issued the orders, he pre-
scribed the watchwords, he gave the signal and he led the
attack.

Lenin was also Vengeance. Child of the bureaucracy,
by birth a petty noble, reared by a locally much respected
Government School Inspector, his early ideas turned
by not unusual contradictions through pity to revolt ex-
tinguishing pity. Lenin had an unimpeachable father and
a rebellious elder brother. This dearly loved companion
meddled in assassination. He was hanged in 1894. Lenin
was then sixteen. He was at the age to feel. His mind
was a remarkable instrument. When its light shone it
revealed the whole world, its history, its sorrows, its stupid-
ities, its diams, and above all its wrongs. It revealed all
facts in its focus — ^the most imwelcome, the most inspiring —
with an equal ray. The intellect was capacious and in
some phases superb. It was capable of universal compre-
hension in a degree rarely reached among men. The
execution of the elder brother deflected this broad white
light through a prism : and the prism was red.

But the mind of Lenin was used and driven by a will
not less exceptional. The body tough, square and vigorous

74

THE WORLD CRISIS: the aftermath

Lenin. in Spite of disease was well fitted to harbour till middle age
these incandescent agencies. Before they burnt it out his
work was done, and a thousand years will not forget it.
Men’s thoughts and systems in these ages are moving for-
ward. The solutions which Lenin adopted for their troubles
are already f alling behind the requirements and information
of our day. Science irresistible leaps off at irrelevant and
henceforth dominating tangents. Social life flows through
broadening and multiplying channels. The tomb of the most
audacious experimentalist might already bear the placard
‘ Out of date.’ An easier generation lightly turns the pages
which record the Russian Terror. Youth momentarily
interested asks whether it was before or after the Great
War ; and turns ardent to a thousand new possibilities.
The educated nations are absorbed in practical affairs.
Socialists and Populists are fast trooping back from the
blind alleys of thought and scrambling out of the pits of
action into which the Russians have blundered. But
Lenin has left his mark. He has won his place. And
in the cutting off of the lives of men and women no Asiatic
conqueror, not Tamerlane, not Jenghiz Khan can match
his fame.

Implacable vengeance, rising from a frozen pity in a
tranquil, sensible, matter-of-fact, good-humoured integu-
ment ! His weapon logic ; his mood opportunist. His
sympathies cold and wide as the Arctic Ocean ; his hatreds
tight as the hangman’s noose. His purpose to save the
world : his method to blow it up. Absolute principles,
but readiness to change them. Apt at once to kill or learn :
dooms and afterthoughts : rufSanism and philanthropy :
But a good husband ; a gentle guest ; happy, Ifis biographers
assure us, to wash up the dishes or dandle the baby ; as
mildly amused to stalk a capercailzie as to butcher an
Emperor. The quality of Lenin’s revenge was impersonal.
Confronted with the need of killing any particular person
he showed reluctance — even distress. But to blot out a
million, to proscribe entire classes, to light the flames of
intestine war in every land with the inevitable destruction
of the well-bang of whole nations — these were sublime
abstractions.

RUSSIA FORLORN

75

‘ A Russian statistical investigation/ writes Professor The Grand
Sarolea, ‘ estimates that the dictators killed 28 bishops,

1,219 priests, 6,000 professors and teachers, 9,000 doctors,

12,950 landowners, 54,000 officers, 70,000 policemen,

193,290 workmen, 260,000 soldiers, 355,250 intellectuals
and professional men, and 815,000 peasants/^ These
figures are endorsed by Mr. Heamshaw, of King’s College,
Cambridge, in his brilliant introduction to 'A survey of
Socialism.’ They do not of course include the vast abridg-
ments of the Russian population which followed from
famine.

Lenin was the Grand Repudiator. He repudiated every-
thing. He repudiated God, King, Coimtry, morals, treaties,
debts, rents, interest, the laws and customs of centuries, all
contracts written or implied, the whole structure — such as it
is — of human society. In the end he repudiated himself.

He repudiated the Communist system. He confessed its
failure in an aU important sphere. He proclaimed the New
Economic Policy and recognized private trade. He repudi-
ated what he had slaughtered so many for not believing.

They were right it seemed after all. They were unluciy that
he did not find it out before. But these things happen
sometimes : and how great is the man who eicknowledges
his mistake ! Back again to wash the dishes and give the
child a sweetmeat. Thence once more to the rescue of
mankind. This time perhaps the shot will be better aimed.

It may kill those who are wrong : not those who are right.

But after all what are men ? If Imperialism had its cannon
food, should the Communist laboratory be denied the raw
material for sociological experiment ?

When the subtle adds he had secreted ate through the
physical texture of his brain Lenin mowed the ground.

The walls of the Kremlin were not the only witnesses of a
strange decay. It was reported that for several months
before his death he mumbled old prayers to the deposed
gods with ceaseless iteration. If it be true, it shows that
Irony is not unknown on Mount Olympus. But this
gibbering creature was no longer Lenin. He had already
gone. His body lingered for a space to mock the vanished
Sarolea, Impressions of Soviet Russia [1924], p. 81.

76 THE WORLD CRISIS : the aftermath

TEe Liberal soTil. It is stiU preserved in pickle for the curiosity of the

statesmea. public and for the consolation of the faithful.

Lenin’s intellect failed at the moment when its destruc-
tive force was exhausted, and when sovereign remedial
functions were its quest. He alone could have led Russia
into the enchanted quagmire ; he alone could have found
the way back to the causeway. He saw ; he turned ; he
perished. The strong illuminant that guided him was cut
of£ at the moment when he had turned resolutely for home.
The Russian people were left floundering in the bog. Their
worst misfortune was his birth: their next worst — ^his
death.

*****

With Lenin had come Zinoviev. Trotsky joined them
a month later. It appears that it was actually at the
request of the Provisional Government that he was allowed
to leave Halifax, Nova Scotia, where he had been shrewdly
intercepted by the Canadian authorities. Under the impul-
sion of these three the differences between the Soviet
and the Provisional Government were soon brought to a
head. During May and June the two powers faced each
other in armed and brawling antagonism. But the Pro-
visional Government had to maintain the daily life of the
nation, to keep order and to produce military victory over
the Germans, while the sole immediate aim of the Bol-
sheviks was a general smash. The eminent Liberal states-
men, Guchkov and Milyukov, well-meaning and unwitting
decoy-ducks, soon passed from the scene. They had played
their part in the astounding pageant of dissolution now in
progress. With the best of motives they had helped to
shake old Russia from its foxmdations ; by their example
they had encouraged many intelligent and patriotic Russians
to put their shoulders to the work. They now found them-
selves destitute of influence or control. Venerable and in
their own way valiant figures they slipped from the stage,
a prey to tormenting afterthoughts. Said Guchkov, ‘ It is
now to be proved whether we are a nation of free men or
a gang of mutinous slaves.’ But words had ceased to count
in the universal chatter.

However, the agony of Russia did not find her without

RUSSIA FORLORN

77

some last defenders. Among these with aU his vanities and Kerensky,
self-delusions Kerensky has his place. He was the most
extreme of all the immature and amateur politicians included
in the Provisional Government. He was one of those
dangerous guides in revolutionary times, who are always
tr37ing to outvie the extremists in order to control them,
and always assuring the loyal and moderate elements that
they alone know the way to hold the wolf by the ears.
Successively he forced changes of policy which moved
his colleagues week by week further to the Left. There
was a point beyond which Kerensky did not mean to go.

Once that point was reached he was ready to resist. But
when at last he turned to fight, he found he had deprived
himself of every weapon and of every friend.

Kerensky succeeded Guchkov as Minister of War in the
middle of May. He became Prime Minister on August 6.

The tide of events which had carried him during a summer
from a revolutionary to a repressive temper had been
strengthened by two personalities. One was the Greneral
Kornilov, a patriotic soldier, resolute, popular, democratic ;
ready to accept the revolution; ready to serve the new
Russian regime with the loyalty he would more gladly have
given to the Czar. Trusted by the troops ; not obnoxious
to the politicians of the hour — ^he seemed to possess many
of the qualities, or at any rate many of the assets, which a
revolutionary government wishing to wage war and to
maintain order required in a commander.

But a more d37naniic figure had arisen in the background —

Boris Savinkov, the ex-Nihilist, the direct organizer of the
pre-war assassinations of M. de Plehve and the Grand Duke
Serge, had been recalled from exile in the early days of the
revolution. Sent as military commissar to the Fourth
Russian Army, he had grappled with mutiny and dissolution
with a quality of energy which amid these boorish Russian
tumults recalls the tenser spirit of the Frendi Revolution.

In so far as comparisons are possible he seems in some
respects to resemble in fiction Victor Hugo's Cimourdain, and
to some extent in real life St. Just ; but with this difference,
that while second to none in the ruthlessness of his methods
or the intrepidity of his conduct, his composed intellect

78 THE WORLD CRISIS : the aftermath

Savinkov, pursued moderate and even prosaic aims. He was the essence

of practicality and good sense expressed in terms of nitro-
glycerine, Above and beyond the whirling confusion and
chaos of the Russian tragedy he sought a free Russia,
victorious in the German war, hand in hand with the Liberal
nations of the West, a Russia where the peasants owned the
land they tilled, where civic rights were defended by the
laws, and where parliamentary institutions flourished
even in harmony perhaps with a limited monardiy. This
man of extreme action and sober opinions had risen in two
months to a position of central dominance in Russian
military affairs. Assistant Minister for War to Kerensty,
and in control of the Petrograd garrison, Savinkov had his
hand on the vital levers. He knew all the forces at work ;
he had the root of the matter in him and he shranV jfrom
nothing. Would he be allowed to pull the levers, or would
they be wrested from his grasp ? Would they act or would
they break ?

Savinkov reached out for Komdlov, he pressed him upon
Kerensky as the one indispensable sword. As the result of a
prolonged internal struggle at the end of July, even the
Petrograd Soviet agreed by a majority to the use of unlimited
authority to restore discipline in the army. On August i,
Kornilov became Commander-in-Chief ; on September 8
the death penalty for breaches of discipline was restored.
But meanwhile the German sledge-hammers were still
beating in the front. The Russian smnmer offensive,
Kerensky s supreme effort, had been repulsed with a woeful
slaughter of the truest and best. In the middle of July the
German counter-offensive had rolled forward, and the towns
of Stamslau and Tamopol were retakai by the Austro-
German forces on July 24. The hostile advance continued.
On September 1 the German Fleet in concert with their
armies entered the Gulf of Riga. Riga fell on the 3rd. The
forlorn nation had to bear simultaneously aU that could be
done by Ludendorff, and all that could be done by
At the culn^ating crisis the electric currents fused all the
wir^, physical and psychological alike. Kornilov revolted
agaii^ Kerensky; Kerensky arrested Kornilov; Savinkov
stiivmg to keep the two together and to fortify the executive

RUSSIA FORLORN

79

power was thrust aside. There was a fleeting interlude of
Babel, of courageous hard-won Duma Resolutions, and of
Russian Democratic Congress appeals for stability. The
Duma, the Parliament of Russia presented a large anti-
Bolshevik majority. The Provisional Government issued
manifestoes in favour of a liberal policy and loyalty to the
Allies. So far as words and votes would serve, nothing
was left undone. Meanwhile the German hammer broke
down the front and Lenin blew up the rear.

Who shall judge these harassed champions of Russian
freedom and democracy ? Were they not set tasks beyond
the compass of mortal men ? Could any men or any
measures have made head at once against the double
assault ? Politicians and writers in successful nations
should not too readily assume their superiority to beings
subjected to such pressures. Caesar, Cromwell, Napoleon,
might have been smothered here like Captain Webb in the
rapids of Niagara. All broke, all collapsed, all liquefied in
universal babble and approaching cannonade, and out of the
anarchy emerged the one coherent, frightful entity and
fact — ^the Bolshevik pimch.

In the first week of Novembor the Soviets, inspired by
a Military Committee headed by Lenia and Trotsisy,
claimed supreme power to command the troops and
arrest the Ministers. Mutinous warships steamed up the
Neva, the troops deserted to the usurpers ; the Duma,
the All Russian Democratic Congress, the All Russian
Congress of Soviets, still talking and all protesting
by substantial majorities, were brudied into the void.
The Provisional Government was besieged in the Winter
Palace. Kerensky, rudflng to the front to gather loyal
troops, was deposed by Lenin’s proclamation, and on his
return was defeated in street fighting by the mutineers.
His last defenders were the women and children. The
battalion of women and the Cadets of the Military College
held unflinching to their posts ; the cadets were shot
and the women were defiled so far as was judged neces-
sary by the new ruling intelligence of Russia. The
British Court of Appeal subsequently decided that for
our domestic purposes the Soviet Govmunent became

The

Bolshevik

Punch.

The Dic-
tatorship.

8o THE WORLD CRISIS: the aftermath

the de facto authority in Russia as from November 14,
1917.

^ jfc 9fc 4c

Gone for ever was the Empire of Peter the Great,
and the long-dreamed-of liberal Russia, and the Duma,
and the already summoned Constituent Assembly. Cast
into outer darkness with the Czarist Ministers were the
Liberal and Radical politicians and reformers. Social
Revolutionaries, Mensheviks, many smaller groups of
Socialists ; all, especially the most extreme, those nearest
in opinion to the Bolsheviks, were marked for destruction.
The doctrinal left flank had been turned, and every
gradation of pohtical opinion known to men crumpled
up almost simultaneously. One sect alone made a
momentary stand. The Anarchists, strong in the tradi-
tions of Bakunin, conceived themselves imapproachable
in extremism. If the Bolsheviks would turn the world
upside down, they would turn it inside out ; if the Bolshe-
viks abolished right and wrong, they would abolish right
and left. They therefore spoke with confidence and held
their heads high. But their case had been carefully studied
in advance by the new authorities. No time was wasted
in argument. Both in Petrograd and in Moscow they
were bombed in their headquarters and hunted down and
shot with the utmost expedition.

The Supreme Committee, sub-human or superhuman —
whidi you will — crocodiles with master minds, entered
upon their responsibilities upon November 8. They had
definite ideas upon immediate policy — ‘ Down with the
War,’ ‘ Down with Private Property,’ and ‘ Death to aU
internal Opposition.’ Immediate peace was to be sought
with the foreign enemy and ine^iable war was to be waged
against landlords, capitalists and reactionaries. These
terms were given the widest interpretation. Quite poor
people with only a handful of savings, or a httle house,
found th^selves denounced as ' Bourjuis.’ Advanced
Socialists found themselves proscribed as reactionaries.
Pending more detailed arrangements, Lenin issued a general
invitation to the masses to ‘ Loo£ the looters.’ The peasants
were encouraged to kill the landlords and seize their States ;

RUSSIA FORLORN 8i

and massacre and pillage, collective and individual, reigned
sporadically over immense areas.

The domestic programme was thus initiated with remark-
able promptitude. The foreign situation was more intract-
able. Lenin and his confederates began their task in the
belief that they could appeal by wireless telegraphy to the
peoples of every waning state over the heads of their
governments. They did not therefore contemplate at the
outset a separate peace. They hoped to procure under
the lead of Russia and under the impact of the Russian
desertion a general cessation of hostilities, and to confront
every government. Allied and enemy alike, with revolt in
their cities and mutiny in their armies. Many tears
and guttural purrings were employed in inditing the
decree of peace. An elevated humanitarianism, a horror of
violence, a weariness of carnage breathed in their appeal —
for instance the following : — ‘ . . . Labouring peoples of all
countries, we are stretching out in brotherly fashion our
hands to you over the mountains of corpses of our brothers.
Across rivers of innocent blood and tears, over the smoking
ruins of cities and villages, over the wreckage of treasures of
culture, we appeal to you for the re-establishment and
strengthening of international unity.’ But the Petrograd
wireless stirred the ether in vain. The Crocodiles listened
attentively for the response ; but there was only silence.
Meanwhile the new regime was sapiently employed in
securing intimate and effectual control of the Czaxist police
and secret police.

By the end of a fortnight the Bolsheviks abandoned the
plan of ‘ peace over the heads of the governments with the
nations revolting against them.’ On November 20 the
Russian High Command was ordered to ‘ propose to the
aiemy milit ary authorities immediately to cease hostilities
and enter into negotiations for peace,’ and on November 23
Trotsky served the Allied Ambassadors in Petrograd with
a note proposing an ‘ immediate armistice on aU fronts and
the immediate opening of peace negotiations.’ Neither the
Ambassadors nor their governments attempted any reply.
The Russian Commander-in-Chief, the aged General
Dukfaonin, refused to enter into communication with the

F

Peace at
any Price.

Brest-

Litovsk,

82 THE WORLD CRISIS : the aftermath

enemy. He was instantly superseded at the head of the
Russian armies by a subaltern ofiBcer, Ensign Krilenko,
who dehvered the arrested general to be tom to pieces by
a mutinous mob. The request for an armistice was then
made to the Central Powers. These Powers also remained
for a time plunged in silence. The promise of ‘ an immediate
peace ' had however to be made good at all costs by the
Bolshevik Government, and orders were issued to the army
at the front for ‘ compulsory fraternization and peace with
the Germans by squads and companies.’ All mihtary
resistance to the conqueror thenceforward became impos-
sible. On November 28 the Central Powers annotmced
that they were ready to consider armistice proposals On
December 2 firing ceased on the long Russian fronts and
the vast effort of the Russian peoples sank at last into
silence and shame.

* * « 4c «

Three months’ negotiations were required before the
Treaty of Brest-Litovsk was signed. The Bolshevik
leaders found this period filled with disappointing experi-
ences. They asked for a six-months’ armistice ; all they
could obtain was a month's respite denunciable at a week’s
notice. They wished to have the negotiations transferred
to a neutral capital like Stockholm ; this was refused.
They sought to explain with their usual volubility to the
conquerors, themselves desperate, the political principles
on which human society should be conducted. ‘ But pray,
dear Sirs,’ asked the German General Hoffman, ‘ what do
we care for your principles ? ’ An inconsistent flicker of
faith to the Allies led them to request that no German or
Austrian troops should during the armistice be transferred
from the East to the West. To this the Germans agreed,
and at once began transporting their troops uninterruptedly
to France. By the end of December such illusions as wi^
singular credulity the Bolsheviks had nursed were at an
end. 'Hiey found themselves confronted with Force armed
and resolute ; and they knew that they had rendered Russia
incapable of resistance.

Nevttthdess, when the meaning of the Peace terms came
home to this strange band of revolutionaries, a spasm of

RUSSIA FORLORN

83

revolt, impotent but intense, shook their condaves. The Bolshevik
cruder spirits raved against Prussian Imperialism ; the
more subtle vented their bitterness in sarcastic newspaper
artides. Trotsky and Zinoviev had indulged in imprudent
mockery and empty threats. ‘ A time would come, Ha !

Ha ! ’ etc. ‘ The destiny of mighty peoples,’ said Trotsky,

' cannot be determined by the temporary condition of their
technical apparatus.’ The Germans remained rigorously
impassive. They received equally with the Bolshevik
delegation representatives of a separate Ukraine Govern-
ment. Vainly the Bolsheviks protested that they and they
alone spoke for all the Russias. The Germans brushed
their expostulations aside. Whatever dse miscarried, the
Central Powers meant to have the com and the oil of the
Ukraine and the Caucasus, and daborate agreements to
secure all they required without pa 3 mient were presented
to the new Ministers of the Russian people.

At the end of Dec^ber the negotiations were suspended
and the Bolshevik delegates returned home to consult with
their confederates. Some details of this new debate in
Pandemonium have beoi preserved. Trotsky, in the rdle
of Moloch, urged the renewal of the war, and the majority
of the secret Assembly seemed to share his passion. The
cahn sombre voice of Lenin rallied them to their duty in a
Bdial discourse of eighteen theses.

'I diould be much for open war, OI Peers,

As not behind in hate.’ . . .

But how coxdd they resist ? The armies were gone, the
Allies estranged, the fleet in mutiny, Russia in chaos 1
Even flight over the vast spaces still at their disposal could
not last long. And was not something more precious
than the fate of Russia at stake ? Was there not the Com-
mrmist Revolution ? Could they fight the Bourjuis at
home if they wasted their remaining strength upon with-
standing the foreign invader ? Geographical boundaries,
political allegiances were not so important after all to Inter-
nationalists striving for world-wide revolution. Let them
make themselves supreme and unchallraigeable in what-
ever territories might still be left to Russia, and from this
as a base spread the social war through every land. The

The German
Advance.

84 THE WORLD CRISIS: the atterimath

arguments of Lenin prevailed. He did not even wait to
hear rejoinders, but sat, according to an English eyewitness,
cool and unconcerned in an ante-room while his followers
frothed and raged inside. The most that Trotsky could
obtain was the formula ‘ No war, no peace.’ The Soviets
would submit, but they would not sign. On February 10
Trotsky stated by wireless ‘ that in refusing to sign a peace
with annexations Russia declares on its side that the state
of war with Germany, Austria, Hungary, Turkey and
Bulgaria has ended. The Russian troops are receiving at
the same time an order for a general demobilization on all
lines of the fronts.’

But this was not good enough for the Germans ; they
allowed a week to pass in silence and on February 17 declared
abruptly that the armistice was at an end and that the
German armies would advance along the whole front at
daybreak. Trotsky’s ululations that they should have
had at least a further week’s notice were drowned in cannon
fire. From Reval to Galatz on a front of a thousand
miles, the German and Austrian armies rolled forward.
There stUl remained a ragged line of troops in various stages
of decomposition and of officers faithful to the end. All
these were now swept away without the shghtest difficulty.
The whole front was destroyed, 1,350 guns were captured in
a single day together with masses of material and prisoners
in a German advance of about 30 miles. The town of
Dvinsk, the principal objective, was captured the same
evening and on the 19th the Soviets made absolute sub-
naission. Trotsky yielded the Foreign Office to the more
pacific Chicherin and on March 3 the peace treaties were
signed.

The Treaty of Brest-Litovsk stripped Russia of Poland,
Lithuania and Courland ; of Finland and the Aaland
Islands ; of Esthonia and Livonia ; of the Ukraine ; and
lastly, in the Caucasus, of Kars, Ardahan and Batum.

‘ This is a peace,’ said the Soviet wireless, ' not based upon
a free agreement but dictated by force of arms . . . which
Russia grmding its teeth is compelled to accept. . . . The
Soviet Govranment being left to its own forces is unable to
withstand the armed onrush of German Imperialism and is

RUSSIA FORLORN

85

compelled for tite sake of saving Revolutionary Russia to
accept the conditions put before her.' Said Lenin some
years later, ‘ We must have the courage to face the rmadomed
bitter truth, we must size up in full to the very bottom the
abyss of defeat, partition, enslavement and humiliation into
which we have been thrown.' It is not possible to better
these descriptions of the first boon which Lenin conferred
upon the Russian nation. In Mr. Buchan’s weU-weighed
words ' They ’ (the Bolsheviks) ‘ lost for Russia 26 per cent,
of her total population, 27 per cent, of her arable land,
32 per cent, of her average crops, 26 per cent, of her railway
system, 33 per cent, of her manufacturing industries, 73
per cent, of her total iron production and 75 per cent, of
her coalfields. So much for the policy of “ No annexations."
They had saddled themselves with a gigantic but as yet
unassessed payment by way of war tributes, and had been
compelled to grant free export of oils and a preferential
commercial treaty. So much for " No Indemnities.” They
had placed under German rule fifty-five millions of
• unwilling Slavs. So much for " Self-Determination.” '

If to-day these consequence have been to any extent
modified, and if the Soviet Republic is independent of
German tutelage and systematic exploitation, it is because
the democracies of the West and across the Atlantic, undis-
mayed by Russian desertion, continued to uphold the com-
mon cause. It was upon them that the re-gathered might
of Germany was now to faU.

Effect of
the Treaty*

CHAPTER V

INTERVENTION

Kornilov and Alexeiev on the Don — ^The Kise of the Russian
Volunteer Army — ^Xhe Munitions at Archangel — Grave Situa-
tion in the West — ^An American-Japanese See-Saw — A New
Feature : Professor Masaiyk — The Czecho-Slovak Army
Corps-r-The Bolshevik Treachery — ^Astounding Retaliation —
Allied Intervention in Siberia — ^The Omsk Government— A Sur-
prising Transformation — The Baltic States — ^Finland — ^Poland
— ^Pilsudski — The Ukraine— Bessarabia.

Kornilov
and Alexeiev
on the Don.

T he Bolshevik truce and later peace with the Central
Powers produced a far-reaching reaction in Russia.
On the same day that hostilities were suspended (December
2, 1917), Generals Kornilov, Alexeiev and Denikin raised a
counter-revolutionary standard on the Don. Each had
made his way to this refuge among the loyal Cossacks by
routes of various hazards. There among the rude surroundings
of a primitive and loyal-hearted population these military
leaders presented a rallying-point for all that was noblest
in Old Russia. What was their polititical authority ? TTie
Imperial regime was discredited with all classes. The Czar
had abdicated and was already approaching the slaughter-
house of Ekaterinburg. Bolshevism stiU masqueraded as
democratic progress carried in the pressure of events to a
violent manifestation. In the domestic sphere nothing could
stand against ' The land for the peasant,' ‘ Soviets for all.'
But the safety and integrity of Russia against the invader,
and the honour of the Russian name plighted to the Allies,
were impulsive and commanding notes to sound. True,
they appealed only to individuals, and these were scattered
along the immense fronts and vast spaces of the interior.
But the trumpet call was carried by the wind across the
steppes and echoed by the mountains, and everywhere, in
every class, in every town, in every village there were ears

86

INTERVENTION 87

to hear it. If world revolution had reared its head, world
civilization was still in the field. More than twenty States
and peoples spread over five continents were marching
against the Central Empires that had laid Russia low. AU
the seas of the world bore their unimpedible ships to the
Western battlefields. Mighty America, far across the ocean,
resounded with a clang of reinforcing preparation. States-
men, whose names were household words, stood at the head
of vast organizations. Although Russia had been struck
down and battered, the Cause continued. Deq)otic govern-
ments should be destroyed and not replaced by other
tyraimies in other forms. For these Russian patriots there
was also the honour of the Russian arms and the inheritance
of Peter the Great to guard or to die in guarding.

The rise and achievements of the Russian Volunteer
Army should certainly form the theme of an historical
monograph to be read with gratitude by all their com-
rades in the British Empire, in France, in Italy and in the
United States, as well as in the smaller States whose freedom
is safe to-day. As news of the mutilations of the Russian
Fatherland, and of the shame in which it had been involved,
gradually permeated the enormous Empire the knowledge of
disaster which appalled the many animated the few. Twenty
Tmknown battles comparable to the fights of Garibaldi or
Hofer or de Larochejaquelem against astounding odds
marked the growth of a troop of desperate refugees into a
substantial nulitaiy entity. One by one the leaders fell.
Konnlov was lolled at the end of March. Kaledin, the leader
of the Don Cossacks, committed suicide after a temporary
defeat. The heaviest loss of all was Alexeiev, a strategist
of the rank of Foch and Ludendorff, long versed in the
highest affairs of the Russian State. He survived the hard-
^ps of the struggle only tmtn September 1918, when he
was succeeded by Denikin who possessed both the qualities
and limitations of a tough, sensible, steady and honourable
military man. In the ups and downs of civil war the
Russian Volunteer Army widely extended the limits of its
authority during the latter part of 1918 ; but for a more
detailed account of its adventures and achievements our
retrospect can find no place. While all else was at first

The Rise of
the Russian
Volunteer
Army.

88 THE WORLD CRISIS: the aftermath

The disputed and confused, a sense of association with the great

K^gel. world outside was a sure foundation upon which the author-
ity of the counter-revolutionary leaders could rest, and this
association was soon to take a practical form.

At the time of the Revolution, France, Britain and the
United Stat^ were engaged in suppljdng munitions to
Russia on a gigantic scale. These munitions had been
purchased by Russia, Czarist and Revolutionary, upon
loans. More than 600,000 tons of military material,
apart from an equal quantity of coal, had been landed at
Archangel and Murmansk. Thither, in the days of the
Czar, a railway 800 miles long from Petrograd had been
built by the unrecorded sufferings of multitudes of war
prisoners. The munitions and supplies lay stranded on
the quays. The Bolshevik Government had repudiated
all the loans by which they had been purchased. They
were therefore in equity the property of the Allies. But
a far more urgent question was ‘ Into whose hands would
they fall ? ’ A similar situation obtained at Vladivostok,
where enormous importations had been made by the
Americans and Japanese. Was aU this mass of deadly
material to replenish the arsenals of the Central Powers
and prolong the war in indefinite slaughter ? Ought it
even to enable a recreant Government, traitor to the
Allies and the avowed foe of every civilized institution;
to crush every form of opposition to its absolute sway ?
These issues arose in the winter of 1917 ; they became
vital even before the Peace of Brest-Litovsk was signed.

The terms of the Treaty made it plain that the blockade
of the Central Powers on which such immense naval efforts
had been concentrated was to a large extent broken. The
Germans obviously had Russia at their disposal. The
granaries of the Ukraine and Siberia, the oil of the Caspian,
aU the resources of a vast continent could, it seemed to
us, henceforth be drawn upon to nourish and maintain
the German armies now increasing so formidably in the
West, and the populations behind them. Germany had
in fact achieved in the early months of 1918 all and more
than she might have won two years before had Falkenhayn
not imprudently preferred to break his teeth on the stones

INTERVENTION

89

of Verdun. How fax or how soon these reliefs could be- Gravs
come effective was uncertain ; but the subsidiary arrange-
ments made with the Ukraine revealed the immediate German West,
intention of overrunning that country and drawing from
it the largest quantities of supplies. No one at this time
saw any prospect of a speedy end to the war, and there
seemed no reason to doubt that the Germans and Austrians
would have the time — ^as they certainly had the power — ^to
draw new life almost indefinitely from the giant Empire
prostrated before them. Finally, the Germans were in pro-
cess of transporting 70 Divisions, comprising more than a
million men, and 3,000 guns with all their mimitions from the
Russian to the Western front. The Austrians had s imil arly
reinforced their Italian front and further reinforcements
were moving westward in a continuous stream. The
French Army had scarcely recovered from the mutinies
of 1917 and the British, in their efforts to take the pressure
off the Frendi and secrue them a breathing space, had bled
themselves white in ceaseless offensives from Arras to
Pasdiendaele. Such was the dark situation on the morrow
of the Russian coUapse. It was soon to become even graver
in the explosion of the greatest battles ever fought.

The reconstitution of an Eastern front against Germany
and the withholding of Russian supplies from the Central
Powers seemed even from the end of 1917 vital to win the war.

The Military Representatives of the Supreme War Coimcil
accordingly recommended on December 23 that all national
troops in Russia who were determined to continue the war
should be supported by every means in our power. In
Siberia one ally above all others could act with swiftness
and overwhelming power. Japan was near, fresh, strong,
ready, and intimately affected. The cormter-argument
was weighty. If Japan was loosed against Russia the
Boldieviks, with the support of the Ru^ian people, might,
it was said, actually join hands with Germany against the
Allies. The Japanese showed themselves not unwilling
to make exertions. They were prepared to take control
of a considerable section of the Siberian railway. But
they said that American participation would be unpopular
in Japan. On December 31 the British Government

90

THE WORLD CRISIS: the aftermath

American-

Japanese

See-saw.

opened these possibiKties to President Wilson. The
United States expressed themselves averse from either
solitary intervention by Japan or combined intervention
by America and Japan. The Japanese were offended by
this attitude, which the British Government at first felt
bound to endorse. They thought they ought to be en-
trusted with any intervention at Vladivostok which naight
be agreed upon, since the development of hostile German
influence on the shores of the Pacific would be a
peculiar menace to Japan. The British Government, with
the support of the French, at the end of January decided
to propose that Japan should be invited to act as the man-
datory of the Allies. President Wilson remained adverse
to all intervention and especially to isolated action by
Japan. The Japanese, on the other hand, stipulated that
if Japan were to act as mandatory for the Powers she must
receive American aid in gold and steel.

The shock of the Treaty of Brest-Litovsk, Ludendorff’s
swiftly following onslaught in the West and the intense
crisis which resulted, extorted from the two desperately
struggling Allies increasingly vehement appeals. President
Wilson however remained unconvinced. For four precious
months a see-saw process between Japan and America
continued in which one or the other successively demurred
to every variant proposed by the French and British.
However, the terrible conflict in France and Belgium and
the increasing German exploitation of Russia presented
arguments of inexorable force. They were aided from an
unexpected quarter. Trotsky was now Minister of War, and
with remarkable energy was creating a Red Army to defend
alike the Revolution and Russia. On March 28 he informed
our Representative at Moscow, Mr. Lockhart, that he saw
no objection to Japanese forces entering Russia to resist
Gennan aggression if the other Allies co-operated and
certain guarantees were given. He asked for a British
Naval Commission to reorganize the Russian Black Sea
Fleet and for a British officer to control the Russian rail-
wa37S. Lastly, even Lenin was said to be not opposed to
fordgn intervention against the G-mans, subject to guar-
antees against interference in Russian politics. Every

INTERVENTION

91

effort was made by the British to obtain a formal invita- A New
tion from the BoMievik leaders. This would have been ^oSsor
all important in overcoming the reluctance of the United Masaryk.
States. Probably the Bolsheviks were only manoeuvring
to gain a measure of external sanction for their regime
in its early da}^ and to baffle and divide the patriotic
antagonisms which were arming against them. Something
else was needed to clinch the issue and bring the five great
Allies into practical agreement. This new incentive was
now to be supplied.

There suddenly appeared in Russia a foreign factor,
unique in character and origin. On the outbreak of war
a number of Czecho-Slovaks resident in Russia had volim-
tarily entered the Russian army. A body of Czecho-
slovak prisoners of war had enlisted in the Serbian volun-
tary division in the Dobrudja. Czecho-Slovaks had also
deserted in considerable numbers and joined their com-
patriots in the Russian army both during the early months
of the war and notably after Brusilov’s victory on the St37r
in 1916. These men had followed the guidance of the
venerable Professor Maseiryk who had lived in London
dming 19x4, ’15 and ’16 as a refugee from Austrian ani-
mosity, and kept alive the conception not only of Bohemian
nationality but of a considerable Czecho-Slovak state. The
bond was purely of intellect and sentiment, but it proved in
men of high morale superior to all the strains of this excep-
tional time. These soldiers, separated from their homes and
families by immense distances, by a world of war and in-
finite confusion, and finally by the offences they had
committed against the Austrian Government, preserved a
disciplined comprehension of national and international
causes and were entirely immune from all local Russian
influence. The Czar’s Government had embodied the
Czecho-Slovaks as mili tary units in the Russian army, but
it had regarded with some misgiving the loyalty of foreigners
who had denied the authority of their legal sovereign.

After the outbreak of the Rusaan revolution, however.

Professor Masaryk went to Russia, brought about the con-
solidation of all Czedio-Slovalc units in one force, placed
them under the red and white flag of Bohemia and procured

THE WORLD CRISIS : the aftermath

92

TheCzecho- for them in Paris the status of an Allied army. From the
moment of the Treaty of Brest-Litovsk they held themselves
Corps. fully armed at the disposition of the Allies for the general
purposes of the war. On a much larger scale and with the
necess£^ differentiations they resembled the Scottish
Archers of Louis XI and the Irish Brigade of Sarsfield,
or the Swiss Guard of Louis XVI, and like them, far from
home and all that home means, surrounded by alien people
whose passions did not stir and whose habits did not attract
them, they lived a life by themselves. But in contrast to
their forerunners they were linked with what had by now
become almost a world cause in which they steadfastly
persevered. By a continued collective study of the course
of the war, by constant gymnastics and intense group-
consciousness they held their heads high through all the
welter : and in the crash of the Russian Empire remained

* Among inmimerable foes unmoved.

Unshaken, tinseduced, unterrified.'

When the Treaty of Brest-Litovsk ended the Russian
resistance to Germany the Czecho-Slovak Army demanded
to be transported to the Western front. The Bolsheviks
were equally anxious that they should leave Russia. A
free exit was promised to the Czechs by the Bolshevik
Conunander-in-Chief and embodied in a formal agreement
between the Allies and the Soviet Government in Moscow
on March 26. The Siberian Railway offered the safest
route and the Czechs began their journey by Kursk, Penza,
Cheliabinsk and Samara. They had started with 42,500
men, but their numbers were increased as they proceeded
by fresh recruits from among the Czecho-Slovak prisoners
of war to a total of about 60,000.

It was natural that the Germans should view these arrange-
ments with disapproval. To prevent the manhood of two
army corps of trustworthy troops from being transported
rormd the world to the Western front became an object of
urgent consequence to the enemy General Staff. Exactly
what pressures they put upon the Soviet authorities is not yet
known. At any rate they were effective. Lenin and Trotsky
freed themselves from their engagements to the Czechs by

INTERVENTION

93

treachery. Measures were rapidly taken under German
direction to intercept and capture the Czech troops on their
long journey. Many thousands of German and Austrian
prisoners in Russian hands were hurriedly armed and under
the supervision of German officers began to assume military
formations. While Trotsky on the one hand was settling
with Mr. Lockhart in detail the safe conduct of the Czechs
through Russia, he was also moving his Red Guard forces
to their appropriate stations. On May 26 the first echelon
of Czecho-Slovak artillery arrived at Irkutsk. Their agree-
ment with the Bolsheviks had left them only 30 carbines
and some grenades for personal self-defence. When the
trains steamed into the station the Czechs found themselves
in the presence of a large and greatly superior force of Red
Guards. They were ordered to surrender their few remain-
ing arms within a period of 15 minutes. While the Czechs,
nearly all of whom were unarmed, were discussing the
situation on the railway-station platform, a machine gun
fired upon them from the station building. The Czechs
did not succumb. The training of the Red Army at this
time had not progressed beyond a knowledge of Com-
munism, the execution of prisoners and ordinary acts of
brigandage and murder. In a few minutes with their 30
carbines and hand-grenades the Czechs not only defeated
but captured and disarmed their deq)icable assailants.
Equipped with the captured weapons they overcame a few
days later new forces sent against them by the local
Soviet, and reported what had occurred to their army
headquarters.

The whole of the Czech troops thereupon ceased to ddiver
up their arms and wherever they stood assumed an attitude
of active self-defence which passed quite rapidly into a
vigorous counter-attack. Their very dispersion now became
the foundation of an extraordinary power. Eleven thousand
had already arrived at Vladivostok, the rest were scattered
all along the Trans-Siberian Railway and its subsidiary
lines from a hundred miles west of the Ural Mormtains to
the Pacific Ocean. By June 6, 1918, they were in possession
of aU the railway stations between Omsk and Krasnoyarsk.
Their comrades still in European Russia had gained corre-

The

Bolshevik

Treachery.

94

THE WORLD CRISIS: the aftermath

Astounding

Retaliation.

ponding successes. Their control of the vital communi-
cations rapidly extended eastward to Nijni-Udinsk and
Penza in the west. On June 28 they assumed control of
Vladivostok ; by July 6 they were moving out of Nikolsk
towards Harbin and Habarovsk. They took charge of
Irkutsk on July 13. By the third week of July an immense
area of Russia, several hundred miles broad and 3,000 miles
long, including the backbone connections from the Volga
River almost to Lake Baikal was in the effectual possession
of these strangers thus foully attacked when seeking to leave
the country in virtue of signed agreements. The pages of
history recall scarcely any parallel episode at once so
romantic in character and so extensive in scale.

We may anticipate the culmination of this effort. Those
Czechs who had already reached and made themselves
masters of Vladivostok determined to return to the rescue
of thdr compatriots cut off in Central Siberia, and by about
the middle of September 1918 railway communication had
again been established along the whole Trans-Siberian route.
Thus, through a treacherous breach of faith, by a series
of accidents' and chances which no one in the world h?id
foreseen, the whole of Russia from the Volga River to the
Pacific Ocean, a region al m ost as large as the continent of
Africa, had passed as if by magic into the control of the
Allies. The message sent by the Czecho-Slovak Army to
Professor Masaryk in the United States at the end of July
epitomizes the situation. ‘ In our opinion it is most desir-
able and also possible to reconstruct a Russian-German
front in the East. We ask for instructions as to whether
we should leave for France or whether we should stay here
to fight for Russia at the side of the Allies and of Russia.
The health and spirits of our troops are excellent.’ The
Czecho-Slovak National CoimcU residing at Washington on
this observed : ‘ Professor Masaryk has since then instructed
the forces in Sibaia to remain there for the present. . . .
The Czecho-Slovak Army is one of the Allied armies and it
is as much under the orders of the Versailles War Council
as the French or American Army. No doubt the Czecho-
slovak boy§ in Russia are aiudous to avoid participation
in a possible civil war in Russia, but they realize at the sa trift

INTERVENTION

95

time that by staying where they are they may be able to
render far greater service both to Russia and the Russian
cause than if they were transported to France. They are
at the orders of the Supreme Council of the Allies.’

* * * * «

These astonishing events as they proceeded were decisive
upon the action of the great Allies. On July 2, 1918, the
Supreme War Council had made from Versailles a further
appeal to President Wilson to agree to the support of the
Czech forces. The President thereupon proposed the dispatch
of an international force of British, Japanese and United
States troops, avowedly to restore and preserve the com-
munications of the Czechs. The next day the British Govern-
ment in concert with their Allies resolved to extend to them
military help. On July 5 the United States announced that
they had decided upon a limited intervention in Siberia
‘ for the purpose of rendering protection to the Czecho-
slovaks against the Germans and to assist in the efforts
at self-government or self-defence in which the Russians
themselves may be ready to accept assistance.’ They also
proposed to send a detachment of the Young Men’s Christian
Association to offer moral guidance to the Russian people.

Two Japanese divisions, 7,000 Americans and two British
Battalions under the command of Colond Johnson and of
Colonel John Ward, a Labour Member of Parliament, 3,000
French and Italians, aU under the supreme command of
Japan, were set in motion, landed as rapidly as possible
at Vladivostok and proceeded westward along the rail-
way. Concurrently with this an international force of
7,000 or 8,000 men, mainly Britidi and all under Britida
command, disembarked in June and July at Murmansk
and Archangel. They were welcomed by the inhabitants,
who expelled the Bolsheviks and formed a local admin-
istration. Agreements were signed between this Northern
Government and the British commander whereby the local
authorities rmdertook to assist the Allies to defeat German
aggression and the Allied Governments became responsible
for finance and food.

In Siberia within the widespread picket hne — for it was

Allied

Intervention
in Siberia.

g6 THE WORLD CRISIS: the aftermath

The Omsk little more — of the Czecho-Slovaks, an Anti-Bolshevik

Government. Government began to organize itself at Omsk.

Broadly speaking, Siberia bore the same relation to
Russia as Canada does to Great Britain. The apparition of
the Czechs, their sudden extraordinary activity and success,
their manifest personal superiority to the armed political
rabble of Bolshevism had created an enormous enclave in
Soviepia, within which a Russian administration and
military organization could be set on foot on a considerable
scale.

In the summer of igi8 a provisional Government was
formed at Omsk, aiming primarily at the convocation of
a constituent assembly for all Russia. This Government
passed through various transformations during its tenure.
It reflected the chaos reigning throughout Russia when
everybody was eager to talk and many were ready to kill,
and no large body of persons could be got to agree upon
anything for any reasonable space of time. Even before
the Armistice cast its fatal depression upon all anti-Bol-
shevik movements, the tide of Siberian fortunes had begun
to ebb. The Czechs were already wear 3 nng somewhat in
wen-doing. Their toils were ceaseless and their dangers
increasing. Their own political opinions were of an •
advanced character, and accorded iU with White Russian
views. They were, moreover, exasperated by constant
contact with Russian instability and mismanagement.
Their far-spread Southern line in October, igi8, had
been forcibly contracted by Red pressure in front and
around them.

Already also by September, igi8, there were two govern-
ments functioning side by side at Omsk— one for Siberia
and the other clai min g to be an aH-Russian body. Mean-
while, Cossack and anti-Bolshevik officers had been ener-
getically raising armed forces. As these forces grew in
size and influence they overshadowed both these mushroom
admmistrations. It became increasingly evident that all
would have soon to fight for their lives, and in these straits
the mihtary point of view quickly became predominant.
The original Omsk Government yielded readily to this new
pressure ; its brother government, on the contrary, became a

INTERVENTION

97

hotbed of socialist conspiracy. The rival administrations a Surprising
counterworked each other. Thefutility of these proceedings ti^.
in the face of impending slaughter led to a military coup
d’itat. On November 17, a week after the Armistice,
the leaders of the new armies forcibly appropriated one
govenunent and arrested the principal members of the
other. They decided, probably wisely in the desperate
circumstances, to concentrate all power in the hands of
one man. They found this man in Admiral Kolchak, the
former commander of the Black Sea Fleet.

At the same time, far to the south in the Province of the
Don, the Russian Volunteer Army, now under Denikin,
had already made itself master of a large and fertile area,
and before the end of the year was destined to advance
to Ekaterinodar after an operation in which over 30,000
Bolsheviks were made prisoners.

Such was the surprising transformation of the Russian
situation which followed the Treaty of Brest-Litovsk. The
snows of winter war had whitened five-sixths of Red Russia,
but the springtime of Peace, for all others a blessing, was
soon to melt it all again.

* * * * *

To the preoccupations whidi these developments caused
the Allies another set of problems was added. The Treaty
of Brest-Litovsk had formally detached from the Russian
Empire all her western provinces. The Germans evidently
had in mind the creation of a chain of buffer states carved
out of the Russian Empire to guard their eastern marches.

We saw reproduced in the twentieth century, and five
hundred miles farther east a new version of Napoleon’s
plan for a Confederation of the Rhine. Finland, Esthonia,

Latvia, Lithuania, Russian Poland, the Ukraine, Bessarabia,
the Caucasus, were all to exorcise under the guidance of a
victorious Germany, and in repulsion from a defeated and
Communist Russia, the power of self-determination. They
iweje to owe their liberty, if not their independence, to
Germany, and the Russian Empire was to be stripped, by
one sabre-cut drawn across the map of Europe from Helsing-
fors to Batoum and Baku, of all the conquests of Peter

G

The Baltic
States.

98 THE WORLD CRISIS: the aftermath

and Catherine the Great. Lenin and Trotsky had agreed
to this.

Imperial Germany had now disappeared ; the mighty centre
of the whole new system had been destroyed. Germany had
yielded herself, disarmed and helpless, at the disposal of the
conquerors, and her part for the time being was punctually to
obey the orders they might give. Therefore all these states
were released almost at a stroke alike from their old allegiance
and from their new. For several months the light of coming
events had shone with increasing plainness. From August,
1918, onwards the defeat of the Central Powers was certain ;
the only questions were how complete it would be and how
long ddayed. Everyone wanted to get out of Bolshevik
Russia, and to the desire for racial or national independence
was added resolve to escape from a frightful reversion to
barbarism and terror. The movement of opinion in every
one of these coimMes was passiona,tely decisive. Esthonia
declared independence on November 28, 1917 ; Finland
on December 6 ; the Ukraine on December 18 ; Latvia
on January 12, 1918; Lithuania on February 16, 1918.
On April 9, Bessarabia contracted a union with Roumania
subject to autonomy ; on April 22 the Transcauceisian
Council declcured the complete independence of its Federal
Republic and claimed to place its territory outside the
operation of the Treaty of Brest-Litovsk. At the end of
May the Transcaucasian Federal Government dissolved
into its constituent elements ; Georgia formed an inde-
pendent national government ; the Armenian National
Council assumed charge in Armenia ; the Tartar National
Council proclaimed the independence of Azerbaijan. All
these movements may be said to have originated in the
prospect of a war settlement in which Germany would have
been the greatest power in Europe. They were now stimu-
lated by the growing fear of Bolshevik aggression, which
Germany was no longer likely to hold in check.

As therefore the power of Germany waned and when
dae suddenly collapsed entirely, every one of these states
transferred their hopes and their loyalty to the league of
victorious democracies whidh from across the Atlantic Ocean
and the Engli^ Channel, and over the battle lines in France

INTERVENTION

99

and Italy, poured an irresistible avalandie of flame and Finland,
steel upon the recoiling German-Austrian fronts. And
when in the end ail resistance fell in one stupendous crash, it
was to the triumphant western allies that all these peoples
and embryo governments rallied with joy and conviction.

However, this transition did not take place without
opposition. The Bolsheviks who, on January 4, had joined
with the French and Swedish Governments in recognizing
the independence of Finland, invaded Finland and captured
Helsingfors on January 28, igi8. This was no ordinary war
of troops and cannon. The Soviet Red Guards advanced by
mob-like methods, and before them, more deadly than carnal
weapons, sprang up the local forces of Communist propaganda
and revolt. Two horrible pages in Finnish history were suc-
cessively written. On March i a treaty of peace and amity
was signed between the Finnish Republic and the Soviet.

A Red Terror followed in Finland. But here the Germans
intervened as rescuers. On April 3 a German division landed
in Finland imder the command of General Von der Goltz ;
and the anti-Communist Finns under General Mannerheim,
an ex-officer of the Russian Imperial Guard, joined them in
large numbers. The Soviet forces and loceil Communists
wore scattered like diafl, and on April 13, Generals Von
der Goltz and Mannerheim reoccupied Helsingfors.

Less than three months of Communist rule had made an
impression upon public opinion which a generation will not
efface. The Communist flight from the Finnish capital
had been hurried ; the corpses of the executed bourgeoisie
cumbered the courtyards and corridors of the public
offices. This dour, northern people, roused to fury, took a
merdless revenge upon their late oppressors. They were
resolved to give them a lesson as lasting as that which they
themsdves had learned. A White Terror, certainly not less
bloody, succeeded the Red. May 7 is regarded as the end
of the Finnish civil war, but it was by no meeins the end of
the punishment inflicted not only upon the Finnish Com-
munists but upon many harmless socialists and radicals
in the tmmeasured and undiscriminating resentment of the
victors. So much for Finland.

Immediately south of Finland the three Baltic States of

Poland.

100 THE WORLD CRISIS : the aftermath

Esthonia, Latvia and Lithuania found themselves in a
pecttliarly unhappy position. They were close neighbours
on the East to Petrograd and Kronstadt, the nurseries of
Bolshevism ; on the West to the birthplace and stamping-
ground of those Prussian landowners who had proved them-
selves to be the most rigid element in the German system
and one of the most formidable. During the winter of 1918
and the early summer of 1919 the Baltic States were sub-
jected alternately to the rigours of Prussian and Bolshevik
domination. Immediately after the Armistice the retiring
Germans mischievously 3delded their mihtary material to
the Bolsheviks, who quickly overran Esthonia and a large
part of Latvia and Lithuania. Assisted by Finnish volun-
teers and British war material the Esthonians drove back
the Bolsheviks at the beginning of February, 1919, but the
Letts and Lithuanians were not so successful. While these
events were in progress, the Germans under Von der Goltz
organized an unauthorized partisan force ultimately num-
bering 20,000 men which was intended to turn out the
Russians and establish -in their stead, and in spite of any-
thing the Peace Conference might decide, a refuge for the
distressed nobility of East Prussia. They were temporarily
successful and exercised like the ' free companies ’ a fierce
and adventurous licence until the arrival in July of an
Allied military mission. In these circumstances it is not
surprising that the independence of Esthonia, Latvia and
Lithuania existed for the time being only in the aspirations
of their inhabitants and the sympathies of the allied and
associated Powers.

Let us turn to Poland. In March, 1917, the Russian
Provisional Government had, as we have seen, declared
that Poland should be ‘ an independent state attadbed
to Russia by a free military union.’ At Brest-Litovsk
Trotsky proposed the independence of Poland, and this
was embodied in the treaty. But the Polish troops in
the Russian army were anti-Bolshevik, and the Polish
Legion in fhe Ukraine soon revolted against the Russian
Soviet Commissariat supervision of Polish national affairs.
The representative in Moscow of the Polish Regency Council
was also at once in full clash with the Soviet Government.

INTERVENTION

lOI

One of those ragged figures which come to the succour PiisudsM.
of peoples in tribulation now appeared upon the scene —

Josef Pilsudski.

Pilsudski was bom in Lithuania in October, 1867, and
he was therefore brought up amongst peasants who had a first-
hand recollection of the atrocities committed after the in-
suixection of 1863. At the age of 22 he became involved
with Russian revolutionaries and was condemned to five
years’ deportation to Siberia. He returned to Vilna in 1892
and four years later was again arrested for sedition, but
escaped. During these years he was intermittingly linked
with Boris Savinkov, and a life-long friendship was formed
between the two men. Pilsudski, in consequence of these
events, natiurally looked on Russia as the principal enemy
of his country. At the outbreak of war in 1914 he devoted
himself to raising a volunteer force for use against Russia
and made Galicia the base of his operations : but he
entered into no engagement with either Germany or Austria.

He had no illusions as to what the fate of Poland would be
if the Central Empires emerged victorious from the war.

While fighting xmder their asgis against Russia and her
allies, he remembered always the ancient Greek saying,

' Love as if you shall hereafter hate, and hate as if you
shall hereafter love.’ The Russian revolution changed
the scene, Czardom disappeared, and the implicit conflict
between Pilsudski and the Central Powers became mani f est.

At the end of July, 1917, he refused to swear allegiance to
them. He was imprisoned at Magdeburg. On regaining his
liberty immediately after the armistice of November, 1918,

Pilsudski was acclaimed as leader not only by the patriotic
military associations which had been growing up during the
German occupation, but by the Polish nation as a whole.

He proceeded to Warsaw, disarmed the German soldiers
left there, and assumed with profound national assent all
the powers of the Regency Council. At the end of January,

1919, Pilsudski, retaining in fact dictatorial authority,
entrusted the formation of the Government to Paderewski,
the great pianist. But the Polish nation had now risen
again to its feet. The ancient state, tom into three pieces
by Austria, Prussia and Russia, had been liberated from

102 THE WORLD CRISIS : the aftermath

The its oppressors and reunited in its integrity after 150 years

of bondage and partition.

In the Ukraine the Bolsheviks had from the first taken
up the challenge of separation. The Germans had signed
their separate peace treaty with the Ukrainian Govern-
ment centred upon Kharkov. But another Ukrainian
Government at Kiev, in sympathy with the Bolsheviks,
carried on armed resistance, both against counter-revolu-
tionary Kharkov and the arriving Germans seeking corn
and oil. The Ukrainian population was distracted by the
double collision between anti-Germanism and anti-Com-
munism, between the foreign invader and the domestic
infection. These conflicting lines of pitiless quarrel ran
through every town, street, village, and family, and even
individuals were often at a loss to teU which side of their
changing partisanships they hated most.

But German efficiency and discipline pushed steadily
through all these feeble-passionate cross-currents. With
small bodies of good soldiers they rapidly occupied most
of the regions necessary to their replenishment. On March
13 > 1918, they occupied Odessa ; on the 17th Nikolaev ;
on April 8 they took Kherson. On the 28th they estab-
lished a military dictatorship in the Ukraine under their
local nominee. General Skoropadski. On May i they
occupied Sevastopol, seizing part of the Russian Black
Sea fleet ; on May 8 they took Rostov on the Don. In
all these operations, resulting in the effective acquisition
of a rich, fertile area the size of a considerable country, not
more than 5 reserve divisions of the German Army were em-
ployed. Everything is relative. Everyone remembers
(and tries to forget) the German occupation of Belgium.
Here in the Ukraine these same Germans catne as deliverers
and were spontaneously recognized as such, not only by
the general population, but by those patriotic elements
most hostile to the invaders of Russia. A dose of Com-
munism induces a desire in any population to welcome any
other form — even the harshest — of civilized authority.
Witii the arrival of the German * steelhelmets ’ hfe again
became tolerable. One had only to subipit, keep quiet,
and obey : thereafter everything was smooth and efficient.

INTERVENTION 103

Better the iron heel of the foreign soldier than unresting
persecution by a priesthood of blackguards and fanatics.^

The situation in Bessarabia was curious and painful in
a different way. The remnants of the Roumanian army
and leading elements of the Roumanian people found a
refuge on Russian territory after the conquest of their
native land. They were sheltered by the Czar. The
revolution and the negotiations of Brest-Litovsk rendered
their position desperate. The old affinity between Roumania
and Bessarabia, and the unceasing quarrel between Russia
and Roumania about this province since the Russo-Turkish
War of 1878, revived simultaneously. On the same day
(January 28) that the Red Guards entered Helsingfors in
the north, the Bolsheviks declared war upon Roumania.
The Roumanians were in no condition to resist, but German
authority intervened and a peace was signed six weeks later.
Then in the depth of her suffering, Roumania, captive and
ruined, attained her heart’s desire. On April 9 Bessarabia
proclaimed her unity with Roumania subject to autonomy.
The ceaseless advance of the German forces in southern
Russia forced the Soviet to content themselves with an
empty protest.

Such was the vast panorama of anarchy and confusion,
of strife and famine, of obligation and opportunity pre-
sented to the western conquerors on Armistice Day.

Bessarabia.

^ A moving account of this phase is found in Once I had a Home^
The Diary of Madejda, Lady of Honour to the late Empress of Russia.

President

Wilson.

m

CHAPTER VI
THE FOURTEEN POINTS

President Wilson — ^The Fourteen Points — ^The Armistice Negotiations
— Colonel House's Commentary — ^The Meeting of October 29 —
Mr. Lloyd George's Refusal — Colonel House's Threat — ^The
Prime Minister Obdurate — ^Allied Reservations — ^The Freedom
of the Seas — ^Agreement reached — ^The French Plan — ^The Pre-
liminaries of Peace — ^Wilson's Mission — Dangers of Delay — The
Gap.

P RESIDENT WILSON reached at the Armistice the
zenith of his power and fame. Since the United States
had entered the War in its thirty-second month he had
proclaimed more vehemently, and upon occasion more
powerfully, than anyone else the righteousness of the
Allied cause. Coming into the struggle fresh and cool,
he had seemed to pronounce the conclusions of an impartial
judge upon the terrible and frantic disputation. High above
the swaying conflict, spealdng in tones of majesty and
simphcity, deeply instructed in all the arts of popular appeal,
clad with power unmeasured and certainly unexhausted, he
had appeared to the tortured and toiling combatants like
a messenger from another planet sent to the rescue of
freedom and jristice here below. His words had carried
comfort to every Allied people, and had been most help-
ful in silencing subversive peace propaganda in all its
forms.

From time to time during the war the various Allies had
declared their war aims. In the bleak January of 1918
both Great Britain and the United States had sought to
restate their case in the most reasonable terms. In par-
ticular on January 8 President Wilson had delivered a
speech to Congress in which he had mentioned fourteen
points which should in his opinion guide American aspiration.
These ‘Fourteen Points,' admirably, if vaguely, phrased,

104

THE FOURTEEN POINTS 105

consisted in the main of broad principles which could be
applied in varying degrees according to the fortunes of war.
They included however two perfectly definite conditions,
the reconstitution of an independent Poland, and the retro-
cession to France of Alsace-Lorraine. The adhesion by the
United States to these profoundly important war-objectives,
involving, as it did a fight to a finish with Germany, was
very satisfactory to the Allies. None of them was con-
cerned to examine the whole speech meticulously or felt
committed except in general sympathy. In the meanwhile
the President’s declaration played an important part
in holding the Western Democracies firmly and unitedly
to the prosecution of the war, and also encouraged
defeatist and subversive movements among the enemy
populations.

When on October i Ludendorff made his panic demand
that the German Government should immediately ask
for an armistice, it was on the basis of these Fourteen
Points that Prince Max of Baden addressed himself to
President Wilson. Wilson seized the opportunity of
keeping the negotiations in his own hands in their first
and aH-important phase. He exploited the advantages of
his position energetically both against the enemy and
against the Allies, so as to engross to himself the whole
task and its responsibility. He refused to transmit the
appeals of the despairing enemy to the Allies imtil he
was himself satisfied of their sincerity. He dealt with
the suppliant Germans in the sternest manner. He used
the weapon of delay with masterly skill. No armistice was
possible, he declared, without ' absolutely satisfactory safe-
guards and guarantees of the maintenance of the present
military supremacy of the armies of the United States and
of its Allies.' The terms of the armistice must be settled
by the Allied Commanders. There could be no question
of discussing peace imtil Germany had deprived hersdf
of all power of resuming the war. The Germans were to
deliver themselves naked and defenceless to the discretion
and judgment of their conquerors. The month occupied
by these parle3dngs had been one incessant gigantic battle
on the whole front. The armies of the United States

The

Fourteen

Points.

io6 THE WORLD CRISIS : the aftermath

The had lost over 100,000 men killed and wounded, and the

French, British and Italians about 380,000. Their advance
had been continuous. German resistance had crumpled
under the double pressure of the terrors of war and the
hopes of peace. At the end they had fallen prostrate at
the Presidential footstool.

Wilson’s conduct of these negotiations had been so strong
and skilful that France and Britain, though at first startled
by his self-assertion, were content to leave them in his hands.
Even the most rigorous against the enemy could find no
fault with his sword-play. He had thus been in the closing
stages of the war the spokesman, for all purposes, not only
of the United States but of the Allies, He had enunciated
the highest principles ; he had driven the hardest of bar-
gains. It was now important to see exactly what this
bargain was.

When it became evident that the Central Powers were
actually in dissolution and were stretching desperate hands
towards the Fourteen Points these propositions suddenly
acquired intense practical significance. It became impera-
tive towards the end of October to make sure what the
• Fomrteen Points meant and would be understood to mean
by friend and foe. Had the Germans, instead of asking
for an armistice, sought a peace by negotiation and mean-
while fought on, the interpretation placed upon the Fourteen
Points by them and by each of the Allies might have
been reduced to an exact and concrete form. But their
collapse was so rapid that they could only sue for an
armistice, and in the mere process of the correspondence
they became utterly prostrate and finally submitted to
conditions which left them henceforword helpless.. This
development which far transcended the highest expec-
tation of the Allies, left the victors sole judges of the
interpretation which should be placed upon the Fourteen
Points, while the vanquished naturally construed them in
their most hopeful and generous sense.

Through the foresight of Colonel House a Commentary
on the Fourteen Points was prepared by the American
Representative in Paris and approved by the President.
This has now been published by Colonel House. It was

THE FOURTEEN POINTS 107

the brief from which he spoke on all occasions and
certainly an accommodating document.

Point III for instance prescribed ‘ ifte removal so far as
possible of all economic barriers, and the establishment of an
equality of trade conditions among all the nations! The
American Commentary prudently explained that this was
not intended to prevent tariffs or special railroad rates or
port restrictions, so long as they were equally maintained
against all. Upon Point IV, ‘ Adequate guarantees given and
taken that national armaments will be reduced to the lowest point
consistent with domestic safety,' it was explained that ‘ domes-
tic safety ’ clearly implied not only internal poHdng but the
protection of territory against invasion. Point V prescribed
‘ A free, open-minded, and absolutely impartial adjustment
of all Colonial claims, based upon a strict observance of the
principle that in determining all such questions of sovereignty
the interests of the populations concerned must have equal
weight with the equitable claims of the Government whose title
is to be determined! On this it was made clear that the
German colonies would not be returned to Germany, but
that whatever Power managed them, must act as ‘ trustee
for the natives ' and be subject to the supervision of the
League of Nations. Point VI, ' The evacuation of all Russian
territory ' and ' an unhampered and unembarrassed oppor-
twnity for the independent determination of her own political
development and national policy! However, it was explained
that ‘ Russian territory ’ did not mean all the territory
belonging to the former Russian Empire. And so on.

A meeting was held at the Quai d’Orsay in the afternoon
of October 29, between the Representatives of France, Great
Britain; Italy and the United States. The principals were
M. Clemenceau, Mr. Lloyd George, Mr. Balfour, Baron
Sonnino and Colonel House. The question was how the
Allies diould reply to President Wilson’s note.

Mr. Lloyd George said that there were two closely con-
nected questions. First there were the actual terms of an
armistice. With this was closely related the question of
terms of peace. If the notes which had passed between
President Wilson and Germany were closely studied, it
would be found that an armistice was proposed on the

Colonel

House’s

Commentary.

io8 THE WORLD CRISIS: the aftermath

The Meet, assumption that the peace would be based on the terms in
oftoiL-29. President Wilson’s speeches. The Germans had actually
demanded an armistice on these conditions ; consequently,
unless something definite was said to the contrary, the Allies
would be committed to President Wilson’s peace terms.
Hence, the first thing to consider was whether these terms
were acceptable. He asked Colonel House directly whether
the German Government were counting on peace being
concluded on the basis of President Wilson’s Fourteen
Points and his other speeches. Colonel House said this
was undoubtedly so. Mr. Lloyd George said that unless
the Allies made their attitude dear, they would in accept-
ing the armistice be bound to these terms.

M. Clemenceau asked whether the British Government
had ever been consulted about President Wilson’s terms.
France had not been. If he had never been consulted, he
did not see how he could be committed. He asked if the
British Government considered themselves committed.
Mr. Lloyd George replied that they were not committed
yet, but if he accepted an armistice without saying any-
thing to the contrary, he would xmdoubtedly regard the
British Government as committed to President Wilson’s
terms. Mr. Balfour confirmed this. Then said Clemenceau,

‘ I want to hear the Fourteen Points.’

The first Point was read.

' Open covenants of peace, openly arrived at, after which
there shall be no private international understandings of any
kind, but diplomacy shall proceed always frankdy and in the
public view.’ .

Colonel House then read an extract from a later speech
made by President Wilson, pointing out that this would
not prohibit secret conversations on confidential and delicate
matters, provided that the final results were made public.
Mr. Balfour said this really amounted to a prohibition of
secret treaties rather than secret conversations.

The second Point was then read.

‘ Absolute freedom of navigation upon the seas, outside
territorial waters, alike in peace and in war, except as the seas
may be closed in whole or in part by international action for
the enforcement of international covenants.’

THE FOURTEEN POINTS

109

This point about what is called the ‘ Freedom of the Seas ’
naturally aroused British concern. It sounded well inten-
tioned, but what did it mean ? Did it mean that the right of
blockade in time of war was abolished ? We were emerging
from a struggle in which blockade had played an important
part in preserving the liberties of Europe and the rights of
the United States. The British Navy had just crushed the
submarine. Britidi ships had just carried the greater part
of the American army to Europe. We had saved ourselves
from invasion and maintained our population unstarved by
sea power. It certainly seemed hard to be told, in the
moment of common victory by the friend we had aided,
that this great weapon of defence was to be blunted if not
broken. It did not follow that the conditions which would
prevail in the future would not require and also render
possible a review of the whole question of belligerent rights
at sea. But now that the enemy’s front was being battered
down by French and British armies after horrible cost in
life and blood, now that Britain tmder the shield of the
Royal Navy was coming safely out of the greatest convulsion
of mankind, was hardly the moment when we should be
asked, at a few da}^’, almost a few hours’ notice, to sub-
scribe to a formula in a matter of life and death which might
mean everything or nothing.

Mr. Lloyd George said he could not accept this clause
under any condition. If it had been in operation at the
present time we should have lost the power of imposing a
blockade. Germany had broken down almost as much
from the efiects of the blockade as from that of the military
operations. . . . He would like to see the League of Nations
thoroughly established and proved before any discussion
on Clause II took place. Even after the establishment of
the League of Nations he would only be prepared to begin
discussing it. He was not prepared to discuss this question
with Germany. It was impossible to make an armistice,
if doing so committed us to these conditions.

Clemenceau and Sonnino agreed with Lloyd George.

Colonel House then said that the discussions were leading
to this, that aH the negotiations up to this point with Ger-
many and Austria would have to be cleaned ofr the slate.

Mr. Lloyd

George's

Refusal.

Colonel

House's

Threat.

HO THE WORLD CRISIS: the aftermath

The President would have no alternative but to tell the
enemy that his conditions were not accepted by his Allies.
The question would then arise whether America would not
have to take up these questions direct with Germany and
Austria.

M. Clemenceau asked if Colonel House meant to imply
that there would be a separate peace between the United
States and the enemy. Colonel House said it might lead
to this. It would depend upon whether America could or
could not agree to the conditions put up by France, Great
Britain and Italy.

Now this was assuming a great responsibility for the
United States. The armies were stiU in full battle.
Even in this month of extreme American effort, nearly
four British, French and Italian soldiers were falling
every day to one American. The stake of the United States
in the European scene was incomparably small, yet here
was a direct threat that if Great Britain, France and Italy
did not swallow the Fourteen Points whole, whatever they
might be, or be claimed to be, the United States would
withdraw from the line, make a separate peace with Ger-
many and Austria, leave the scene in perfect confusion and
condemn the world to another year of war. It is a measure
of Lloyd George’s quality when acting for his country that
he did not quail before this imwarrantable pressure.

The Prime Minister replied that it was impossible for the
British Government to agree to Point II. If the United
States were to make a separate peace we should deeply
regret it, but nevertheless should be prepared to go on
fighting. (Clemenceau here interjected * Yes.’) ‘ We
could never give up the one power which had enabled
the American troops to be brought to Europe. This was a
thing we were prepared to fight for and could not give up.
Great Britain was not really a military nation ; its main
defence was its Fleet. To give up the right of using its
Fleet was a thing no one in England would consent to.
Moreover, our sea power had never been exercised harshly.
. . , Apart from the question of Freedom of the Seas,
there was no word in President Wilson's speech about
reparation for the wanton destruction of property in

THE FOURTEEN POINTS

III

Belgium and France, and the sinking of ships. Other- The Prune
wise he had no objection to the President's Fourteen oMurate.
Points. He suggested that a reply should be sent to the
President in the sense, that the Fourteen Points must
include reparation ; that we believed reparation was in-
cluded in the President’s speeches, but that we wished to be
perfectly dear about it, and that we could not accept the
interpretation which we understood Germany put upon the
point about the Freedom of the Seas.’

Colonel House agreed that the first step was for the Allied
Governments to get together and make their exceptions
to President Wilson’s terms. He said later, after other
points had been mentioned, that the President's condi-
tions were couched in very broad terms. In the case of
Alsace-Lorraine, for example, he did not say specifically
that it would go back to France, but he intended it
positively. M. Clemenceau said the Germans certainly did
not place that interpretation on it. Colonel House con-
tinued that the President had said so much [i.e. made
this clear] on other occasions. He had insisted on Germany
accepting all his speeches and from these you could
establish almost any point that anyone wished against
Germany. Reparation for Belgium and France was
certainly implied in Clauses VII and VIII, where it was
these invaded countries must be stated that evacuated
and ‘ restored.’ The same principle applied to illegal
sinkings at sea. and to the sinking of neutrals.

It was then agreed that the reservations of the Allies
should be formulated.

Nearly a week passed in tension. President Wilson
armed Colonel House with an ultimatum which his repre-
sentative decided to hold in reserve. On October 30 : ‘ I
feel it my duty to authorize you to say that I cannot con-
sent to take part in negotiations of a peace which does not
include the Freedom of the Seas, because we are pledged
to fight not only Prussian militarism but militarism every-
where. Neither could I participate in a settlement which
does not include the League of Nations because such a
peace would result within a period of years in there being
no guarantee except rmiversal armaments which would be

II 2

THE WORLD CRISIS: the aftermath

Allied disastrous. I hope I shall not be obliged to make this

Reservations. ... , , . , ,

position public. ^

Meanwhile a British draft of reservations was prepared.

' The Allied Governments have given careful considera-
tion to the correspondence which has passed between the
President of the United States and the German Government.
Subject to the qualifications which follow, they declare
their willingness to make peace with the Government of
Germany on the terms of peace laid down in the President’s
address to Congress of January 8, 1918, and the principles
of statements enunciated in subsequent addresses. They
must point out, however, that Clause II, relating to what is
usually described as the Freedom of the Seas is open to var-
ious interpretations, some of which they could not accept.
They must therefore reserve for themselves complete free-
dom on this subject when they enter the Peace Conference.’

‘ Further in the conditions of Peace laid down in his
address to Congress of January 8, 1918, the President
dedaxed that the invaded territories must be restored as
well as evacuated and freed. The Allied Governments feel
that no doubt should be allowed to exist as to what this
provision implies. They understand that compensation
would be made by Germany for all damage done to the
civilian population of the Allies and their property by the
forces of Germany, by land, by sea and from the air.’

The Italians had other reservations, but it was pointed
out that the present negotiation only applied to Germany,
and did not govern the treatment of Austria-Hungary.
M. Clemenceau accepted the British draft, and this became
the crucial document.

A third meeting was held on November 3 in Colonel
House’s residence when House read a message firom Presi-
dent Wilson in conciliatory amplification of the formula
‘ Freedom of the Seas.’

‘ The President says that he freely and sympathetically
recognizes the necessities for the British and their position
with regard to the seas both at home and throughout the
Empire. Freedom of the Seas, he realizes, is a question
upon which there should be the freest discussion and the
most liberal exchange of views. The President is not sure,
however, that the Allies have definitely accepted the prin-
^ House, Papers, Vol. TV, p. 173.

THE FOURTEEN POINTS 113

ciple of the Freedom of the Seas and that they are reserving
only the limitation and free discussion of the subject. . . .
The President insists that Terms I, II, III and XIV are
essential American terms in the programme and he cannot
recede from them. The question of the Freedom of the
Seas need not be discussed with the German Government
provided we have agreed amongst ourselves beforehand.
. . . Blockade is one of the questions which has been
altered by developments in this war and the law govern-
ing it will certainly have to be altered. There is no danger,
however, that it will be abolished.'

Mr, Lloyd George said that the formula adopted by the
Allies simply provided for free discussion [on Point II] and
did not challenge the position of the United States who were
perfectly free to go into the Conference and urge their own
point of view.

Colonel House asked if Mr. Lloyd George could not accept
the principle of the Freedom of the Seas. The Prime
Minister replied that he could not. ‘ It had come to be
associated with the idea of the abandonment of the blockade.
He did not want to bind the American Government in their
discussion, he only wanted to have a free hand for the British
Government.’ On Colonel House again asking that the
principle should be accepted Mr. Lloyd George repeated
his refusal. ‘ Were he to accept,' he said, ‘ it would only
mean that in a week's time a new Prime Minister would be
here who would say. that he also could not accept the prin-
ciple. The English people would not look at it. On this
point the nation was absolutely solid. Consequently it was
no use for him to say that he could accept when he knew
he would not be speaking for the Britidi nation.' And
again, according to Colonel House, (whether at this meeting
or at some other is not dear) Mr. Uoyd George said that
‘ Great Britain would spend her last guinea to keep her
navy superior to that of the United States or any other
Power, and that no Cabinet Official could continue in the
Goverrunent in England who took a different position.'^
Colonel House then modified his position; all that he
wanted was ‘ the principle that the question could be dis-

^ Ibid., p. 190.

The Freedom
of the Seas.

Agreement

Reached.

114 THE WORLD CRISIS : the aftermath

cussed.’ No one could object to that. Mr. Lloyd George
replied at once, ' We are quite ■willing to discuss the Freedona
of the Seas in the light of the new conditions which have
arisen in the course of the present war.’ According to House
the actual conversation was —

‘ I •wish you would write something I could send to the
President/ said House.

‘ Will he like something of this kind ? ' returned Lloyd
George — ' We are quite ‘wiUing to discuss the Freedom of
the Seas and its application.’ He confirmed this by letter
to Colonel House the same afternoon. House contented
himself with this, and has rather naively informed us that
he reported a diplomatic victory to the President.^

These matters being adjusted. President Wilson on
November 5 forwarded to the Germans the Allied Memor-
andum accepting ■with reservations the Fourteen Points as
the basis of peace, and informed them that Armistice terms
could be received from Marshal Foch. The Germans had
therefore a right to claim that they surrendered and dis-
armed themselves on President Wilson's Fourteen Points
and other speeches except in so far as these were modified
by the formal reservations of the Allies. They were not,
however, accorded — ^nor were they in a position to request
— any share in the interpretation. This left a latitude to
the victors certainly wide enough for misunderstanding and
reproach in after years.

* * « * *

The sharp interchanges which had taken place within the
councils of the Allies, the vague character of many of the
Fourteen Points and the President’s speeches which were to
be read ■with them, to say nothing of the Commentary, made'
it especially desirable to frame ■without delay a more
precise instrument. But nothing was possible for some
weeks. The slaughter had to stop. The drawing up of
the armistice terms for land and sea, the vast surrender by
Germany of her whole remaining powers of self-defence,
the mtemal con^vulsions in Germany and in other defeated
coimtiies, and the celebrations of ■victory by the Allies
filled the compass of human nature. ’When these over-
^ House, Papers, Vol. IV, p. 190.

THE FOURTEEN POINTS

115

whelming events and emotions had passed, one fact The French
dominated the scene. It was above all things important
to make Peace soon.

M. Clemenceau as usual had clear-cut plans. On Novem-
ber 29 the French Ambassador in Washington laid these in
writing before Mr. Lansing.

‘ The arrival of President Wilson in Paris in the middle
of December will enable the four Great Powers to agree
among themselves upon the conditions of the peace pre-
liminaries to be imposed severally on the enemy without
any discussions with him.’

' The examination will first apply to Germany and
Bulgaria. . , .’

‘ After reaching an agreement as to the peace prelimin-
aries, the representatives of the Great Powers will have to
come to an agreement on the principles of the representation
of the sever^ belligerent, neutral, and enemy states at the
Peace Congress. . . . The great victorious powers alone
will attend all its sessions, the small powers being called
only to sessions designated for their special affairs. As
for the neutrals and states in formation, they may be called
when their own interests are at stake. . .

' It seems that the laboiurs of the Congress should be
divided into two main series : the settlement of the war
properly so-called, and the organization of the Society of
Nations. The examination of the second question no
doubt calls for the settlement of the first. Furthermore,
the settlement of the concrete questions should not be
confounded with the enforcement of the stipulations of
general public law. Besides, that distinction is made
necessary by the fact that the enemy has no right to discuss
the terms that will be imposed upon him by the victors,
and that the neutrals wiU only be called in exceptional
cases to attend the sessions where the belligerents will fix
the peace terms, while all the peoples, whether belligerents,
neutrals or enemies, will be called to discuss and taie part
in the principle of the Society of Nations.’

‘ The procedure of the Congress will also be determined
at the preliminary meetings in the second half of
December. . .

‘ The Congress finally could place itsdf as has sometimes
been done in the past xmder the invocation of some of the
great principles leading to justice, morals and liberty,
which would be proclaimed at its very opening and even
before fixing the procedure (concerning whidi an imof&cial
agreement only would have been readied) : right of self-

ii6 THE WORLD CRISIS: the aftermath

The

Prelimmaries
of Peaco.

determination of the peoples, rights of [the] minorities,
suspension of dH previous special agreements arrived at
ly some of the Allies only, with a view to the fullest free~
dom?- of [the] examination by the Congress, declaration
that the metropolitan and colonial territory held by the
Allies on August i, 1914, shall not be touched, solemn
repudiation of all [the] violations of international law and
of humane principles, and disqualification of enemy delegates
who have signed violated instruments or are personally
guilty of violations of the law of nations or of [the] crimes
against humanity.’

There is no doubt that the French plan was at once logical,
practical and speedy. It placed the settlement of all main
questions and aU procedure definitely in the hands of the
four great victorious powers who had made the chief
exertions in the war ; it drew a line between the past and
the future ; above all by the ' suspension of all previous
special agreements arrived at by some of the Allies oidy,'
it swept away the whole network of secret treaties con-
tracted in the stress of the war. It brought together the
four authorities who alone could settle everything, and
secured for them an absolutely free hand.

The mature reflections of Colonel House have led him to
believe that a preliminary peace should have been negoti-
ated with Germany at the earliest moment. There would
have been no difficulty in grafting on to the foundation
proposed by the French a preliminary peace. This was a
device which had often been found helpful in the past. In
a preliminary peace only the main essentials axe settled
between the belligerents, and they then meet together no
longer at war to argue at leisure about details and their
application. Nothing in the French procedure would have
prevented President Wilson from striving, had such been
his inclination, for the most lenient terms towards the con-
quered enemy, or for any disposition of the captured
territories which he thought would in the long run be best.
Grave conflicts of opinion were inevitable in any case.
But they would have arisen in their natural order and each
decision would have made the treatment of secondary
problems easier. An agreement between the ' Big Four,'
*Autiior’s italics.

THE FOURTEEN POINTS

117

as they afterwards came to be called, was the indispensable President
prelude to a smooth and speedy peace. Mission*

The French plan, however, did not at aU commend itself
to Mr. Wilson, It thrust on one side aH the pictures
of the peace conference which his ambition and imagination
had painted. He did not wish to come to speedy terms
with the European Allies ; he did not wish to meet their
leading men around a table ; he saw himself for a prolonged
period at the smnmit of the world, chastening the Allies,
chastising the Germans and generally giving laws to man-
kind. He believed himself capable of appealing to peoples
and parliaments over the heads of their own governments,
and he had as we have seen already hinted a willingness to
try.^ No doubt the French proposal was injudiciously
framed; in parts it w'ore an air almost of cynicism. It
seemed to treat high ideals as if they were a mere garnish to
agreements on sound policy. The President understood that
the over-strained European Allies would be above all things
anxious for swift settlement ; and that delaying procedure
would increase his bargaining power. So no answer was
returned either by him or by Mr. Lansing to the French
Note of November 29 ; and no notice whatever was taken
of the French proposal to sweep away the secret treaties.

All Old World affairs therefore hung in suspense ; and
instead of leaders meeting together in good-wiU and good
faith to make a lasting settlement, the governing forces in
each coimtry drifted into an intensive development of
their own points of view.

The French soon began to recondle themselves to this
delay. If President Wilson was coming to Europe not
only to punish the Germans but to discipline them, it perhaps
was not regrettable that their armies were getting a firm
grip on the Rhine and that the peace conference, whenever
it should assemble, would be confronted with accomplished
facts. Great Britain was still in the throes of the Election,
the results of which were not yet known. The Imperial
War Cabinet sat almost daily and surveyed the whole future
field of the peace. The only inter-Allied discussion which
took place in this interval was the meeting in London on

1 P. I 12.

ii8 THE WORLD CRISIS; the aftermath

Danger of
Delay.

December 2 and 3 between Lloyd George, Clemenceau and
Orlando, House being absent through illness. This meeting,
apart from various matters arising out of the Armistice,
decided only that an inter-Allied commission should be set
up to report on the amount the enemy countries could pay
for reparations and indemnities ; that the Kaiser and his
accomplices should be brought to trial before an international
court, and that before preliminaries of peace should be
signed an inter-Allied conference should be held in Paris
or Versailles and the date thereof be settled after the arrival
of President Wilson.

Here when time is vital and strength in aU its forms is
ebbing from the victors, we have a ready acceptance of
delay. No doubt aU these leading men were too easily per-
suaded that the world would remain at their feet indefi-
nitely and that they could settle its future fortunes at leisure.
Most of aU did this illusion dwell with President Wilson.
He now wished to preside himself over the Peace Conference.
When House tactfully explained that only a Frenchman
could preside over a conference held in Paris, he made it dear
that he would sit as a delegate. His best friends in the
United States advised him strongly not to descend into the
arena. To visit Europe to discuss the main issues in private
with the Eiiropean statesmen was permissible and even
desirable ; but to quit the lofty isolation of his Presidential
chair for the rough and tumble of a prolonged peace con-
ference, was to sacrifice solid advantages. This American
advice was at first strongly reinforced by the wishes of the
three European Prime Ministers. They were disturbed at
the idea of the head of a state, a personage of sovereign
rank, sitting with them nominally on equal terms but with
inalienable superiority of status. They were alarmed by
much that they had heard of Wilson’s autocratic temper and
airs. But the desires of the President overrode his own
advisers, and the Allied chiefs gradually realized that perhaps
the President’s mistake would conduce to their advantage.
If he chose to step down from his pedestal, why were
they the losers ? House assured them that he was affable
in pemonal relations. So the President had his way.

In these discussions and in the immense press of events.

THE FOURTEEN POINTS

119

November and December soon slipped away, and it was not ^he
until the middle of January that the representatives of
the Twenty-Seven States which had either fought the war
or ultimately joined the winning side assembled in Paris.

The most cumbrous procedure had been adopted. But
the one feature which would have redeemed it had some-
how or other been omitted. All depended upon a serious
discussion at the outset between Great Britain, France,
Italy, Japan and the United States, at which the main
principles could be settled- But this discussion never took
place. The two months that followed the Armistice had
produced no progress of any kind towards the systematic
disctission of the peace settlement. By the beginning of
January the world was restive ; everyone asked what had
happened to the Peace ; the representatives of all the
smaller states were already congregated in Paris where
they foimd assembled all the journalists of the world. The
second stage, or general meeting of all the Powers, overtook
and overwhelmed the first. Further delay cotild not be
tolerated and the conference sprang into being before the
fundamental questions had even been surveyed in common
by those who alone had the power to decide.

i&H-tgtg.

CHAPTER VII
THE PEACE CONFERENCE

1814-1919 — The Literature — A Film Production — ^Wilson at his
Zenith — The Congressional Elections — ^The Adverse Senate —
Wilson's Misconceptions — ^The Consequences — ^The ‘ Plain
People ’ — ^The Secret Treaties — ^Under Duress — ^The Disclosure
— The True American View — ^The Defence of the Allies — ^The
British Peace Delegation — ^The British Empire Delegation —
The Composition of the Conference — President Wilson's Com-
promise — ^The Press — ^The Official Languages — Europe in Con-
vulsion.

H OW wide is the contrast between the conditions of the
Peace Conference in 1919 and those in which the
Congress of Vienna had met in 1814 ! In 1814 the victorious
Allies were in effective possession of practically the whole
of Europe. They had the physical power to impose their
will. In 1919 the dangers were more acute and the victors
were much more exhausted; large regions and cardinal
factors remained outside their control. In 1814 a group
of Aristocrats, life-trained as statesmen or diplomatists,
utterly wearied of war and hating change, met together in .
elegant and ceremonious privacy to re-establish and fortify,
after twenty years of tumult, a well-understood conservative
system of society. In 1919 the orators and mass leaders
who had risen to the dizzy summits of power and victory
in the rough and tumble of the struggle all balanced them-
selves precariously upon the unsure shifting platform of
public opinion, and dakned to be guiding mankind to higher
destinies. Public opinion was, it is true, focussed and
steadied to some extent by the Parliaments. But it was
also vdiemently swayed by the Press, In 1814 calm,
deliberate conclaves of comfortable and firmly established
personages : in 1919 a turbulent collision of embarrassed
demagogues who were also great men of action, each of

120

THE PEACE CONFERENCE

lai

whom had to produce a triumph for himself and his Party
and give satisfaction to national fears and passions well
founded or not. In these circumstances the historian of
the future must judge, much less their shortcomings and

failures, than their substantial adiievements.

****)•:

The literattire upon the Peace Conference, represented in
almost every known language, is large, and that upon the
Peace itself far larger. The first place must be assigned to
Dr. Temperley’s monumental work. Although Dr. Temper-
ley did not feel at liberty to publidi all the information and
documents at his disposal, his six volumes hold their place
as the unique and indispensable guide for any student.
Of French books, M. Tardieu’s The Truth about the Treaty is
the most important, partly because he was one of those who
acted for France at the Conference, and partly because he
publishes many documents which have not appeared else-
where. M. Mermeix has also in his Combat des Trois printed
important extracts from the secret minutes of the Supreme
Coimcil and from those of the Council of Four. The
principal Italian contribution is comprised in three volmnes
from Signor Nitti. The American point of view is repre-
sented first by Mr. Stannard Baker’s Woodrow Wilson
and the World Settlement, of which more later ; secondly, in
Colonel House’s Papers, edited by Mr. Seymom: ; and thirdly
by Mr. Lansing's Peace ' Negotiations. There is also the
admirable and scholarly Drafting of the Covenant, by Mr.
David Himter Miller ; and on the Russian aspect Dennis’s
Foreign Policy of Soviet Russia and Russian-American
Relations, compiled by Messrs. Cumming and Pettit.

Mr. Stannard Baker’s work is distinguished from all these
publications, both by the wealth of secret information at
his disposal and the peculiar manner in which he has used
it. Prerident Wilson at the end of 1920 placed at the
disposal of this gentleman, formerly the head of his
Press Bureau while in Paris, two trunks and three steel
boxes containing all his records of the Peace Conference.

' I plunked them into the trunk in Paris,’ he wrote, ' and
have not had time or physical energy even to sort or arrange
them.’ Mr. Baker lost little time in presenting these trea-

The

Literatore.

122

A Film
Production.

THE WORLD CRISIS : the aftermath

sures to the world in the form of a sustained defence of the
President’s conduct and policy. In his object of vindicating
his honoured chief, Mr. Baker will be supported by the
sympathy of the Allied nations ; and certainly it is not from
tihpim that much harsh criticism has come. Everyone
recognizes the high motives which inspired Mr. Wilson's
actions, his remarkable abilities, his comprehensive goodwill
and his readiness to arrive at practical solutions. He was
a good friend, not only to the Allies but to Europe. He
faced the real facts as he gradually got to know them, not
only with lofty idealism but with s3Hnpathy and common
sense. The part he played in the making of the treaties
was marked by the strictest loyalty and good faith ; and the
last remnants of his life and strength were freely expended in
trying to make good the obligations into which he had
entered and to which he had pledged his country. His
memory should long command the sympathy of Europe.

But Mr. Baker detracts from the vindication of his hero
by the absurd scsnario picture which he has chosen to paint.
Wilson’s diare in the Peace Conference, his hopes, his
mistakes, his achievements, -his compromises and his disasters
are worthy of something better than the Hollywood setting
with whidi we are provided. In conventional film style all
the lights are heightened and aH the shadows darkened.
The apparatus of lurid contrast is lavishly employed. A
plot suited to the more fruity forms of popular taste is
chosen ; and the treatment of facts, events and personalities
is compelled to conform to its preconceived requirements.
For this purpose the President is represented as a stainless
Sir Galahad championing the superior ideals of the American
people and brought to infinite distress by contact with the
awful depravity of Europe and its statesmen. Mr. Baker’s
film story is, in short, the oldest in the world. It is no thing
less and nothing more than the conflict between good and
evil, between spiritual conceptions and material appetites,
between generosity and greed, between moral earnestness
and underhand intrigue, between human sympathy and
callous selfishness.

The plot is certainly sensational, but it hardly represents
what actually happened. It is difilcult to believe that the

THE PEACE CONFERENCE

123

European emigrants by whom America has been populated
took away with them all the virtues and left behind them
all the vices of the races from which they had sprung ; or
that a few generations of residence on the other side of the
Atlantic Ocean is sufficient to create an order of beings
definitely superior in morals, in culture and in humanity to
their protot3?pes in Europe. The American sense of humour,
it is hoped, will itself supply to such claims the necessary
correctives. It would seem probable that on both sides of
the Atlantic men find it easy to be disinterested upon ques-
tions which do not affect them directly ; that they axe often
indined to prescribe high principles for others to follow;
that they can resist austerely other people’s temptations.

However, let us allow Mr. Stannard Baker to open his
tale in his own fashion :

‘Three weeks and three days after the last victorious
shots of the Great War had been fired by Yankee dough-
bo}^ in the French Argorme, the American peace argosy —
the George Washington, with accompan37ing wairiiips —
dropped down through the bedecked and beflagged harbour
of New York, a new Sania Maria on its extraordinary
voyage of discovery to an unknown world. The great drip
passed majestically out throu^ the Narrows, with air-
planes cutting the sky above and the forts on either hand
roaring with unprecedented salutes of twenty-one guns;
for never before had a President of the United States set
sail for a foreign land.’

Modem technical conditions have given so great an
extension to publicity that comparisons with other times
are vitiated. It se^ns probable that no human being has
ever centred in himself more hopes or enjoyed a greater,
if transient, prestige than President Wilson as he paced
the decks of the ‘ American peace argosy.’ But the
reverse of the medal bore sinister emblems. Mr. Baker
has depicted the difficulties which awaited the President
in Europe, and the tragic contrast between his noble
outlook and the degradation of the old diplomacy. He
has not dwelt sufficiently upon the difficulties he left
behind him in the United States. Here, too, the old Adam
manifested itself in recalcitrant forms, and the spirit of

Wilson at
his Zenith.

1^24 THE WORLD CRISIS : the aftermath

The Con-

gressionai Partv poKtics had raised its tmregenerate head. But for

Elections. ^ ^ ^ j. xv xv -x-

this aspect we must turn to other authonties.

The Republican Party view has been explained by Mr.
Hollis^ in terms which, though disfigured by bias, imdoubtedly
described a widespread American opinion.

' The world was before him hke a class. The sight of it
turned the head of the pedagogue made prince. In
November 1918 took place the elections to Congress. As
the summer drew to an end there began to trickle in from
Democratic candidates throughout the country requests
that the President give them a letter of endorsement. It
was decided that the best plan would be for him to make a
speech at some central Middle Western town such as
Indianapolis, in which he would appeal to the country not
to favour one Party rather than the other but to give him a
Congress which would support him in his leadership of the
national efiort of war. . . . Burleson, the Postmaster-
General, had advised this plan, and went off to Texas for
ten days at the end of September assured that his advice
would be followed. On his return he found that behind his
back the party politicians had brought pressure upon Wilson
to cancel his speech at Indianapolis and instead to write a
letter appealing for a Democratic Congress. This letter
Burleson found had already been given to the Press. It was
interpreted, as Burleson foresaw that it would be, as an
abominable slur upon the loyalty of Republicans ; and its
publication made certain an overwhelming Democratic
defeat. Wilson was at the time, according to Mr. White's
explanation, " in the upper spiritual zones of idealism,” and
therefore not at leisure to correct the popular impression that
the letter was sent on Burleson's responsibility.

European opinion upon this episode is not important. But
its consequences were formidable. The Republican party,
who had given much patriotic support to the President's war
policy, deemed themselves ‘ gratuitously and outrageously
insulted.’ The November election gave them a majority in
Congress, and they already possessed a substantial majority
in the Senate. The American Constitution requires the
ratification of all treaties by the Senate. It seemed to
British and French eyes very curious that in the war crisis
President Wilson did not seize the opportunity of becoming

1 The American Heresy, by Cbristopbsr Hollis. Shsed and Ward,
Paternoster How.

THE PEACE CONFERENCE

125

a National rather than a Party leader. It is still more
remarkable that, confronted with the fact of a hostile
majority in the Senate, he did not endeavour to associate
that body as a whole with the Treaty negotiations. It
would have been impossible, if the President had forced
the issue, for Republican senators to refuse to form
part of a Senatorial delegation to the Peace Conference ;
on the contrary, they would probably have been de-
lighted to go ; and Wilson could then have been assured
that what he promised would not be repudiated. His
strong Party feeling and his sense of personal superiority
led him to reject this indispensable precaution. The
' American peace argosy ’ wended on across the waters
bearing a man who had not only to encounter the moral
obliquity of Europe, but to produce world salvation in a
form acceptable to political enemies whom he had deeply
and newly offended. Upon him centred the hopes of the
world. Before him lay the naughty entanglements of
Paris ; and behind him, the sullen veto of the Senate.

Nevertheless, it was with no sense of personal inade-
quacy that the President surveyed his task.

‘ Three days before the George Washington sailed into
Brest Harbour in a blaze of glory the President called
together a group of the delegation for a conference. There
were two members of the Peace Commission itself on the
ship. Secretary Lansing and Mr. White (Colonel House and
General Bliss being already in Europe), but the great body
of the delegation was made up of geographers, historians,
economists, and others upon whom the President was to
depend for the basic facts to be used in the coming dis-
cussions.' ^

' After a few introductory remarks to the effect that he
was glad to meet us,’ writes Dr. Isaiah Bowman, who alone
kept a record of this meeting, ‘. . . the President remarked
that we would he the only disinterested people at the peace
conference, and that the men whom we were about to deal with
did not represent their own people' •

The first of these two statements can best be judged in

1 Stannaid Baker, Vol. I, p. 9,

® The Drafting of the Covenant, by David Hunter Miller, p. 41.
Tbe italics are Mr. Miller's,

The Adverse
Senate.

126 THE WORLD CRISIS: the aftermath

Wilson*s

Misconcep-

tions.

the light of ultimate events. The second reveals an un-
doubted misconception. The European statesmen whom
President Wilson was about to meet represented only too
well, in the assertion of national claims and in severity to the
beaten enemy, the views and wishes of their own peoples.
They ceased and failed to represent them only in so far as
they diverged from these hard standards, and guided by
experience, tolerance and detachment sought to mitigate
the misfortunes of the vanquished, or to disappoint their
own national expectations. Orlando, in making the most
extreme claims, fell short of Italian aspirations. The iron
Clemenceau, the prop of France, was throughout and is
to-day condemned by the French for weakness iu champion-
ing his country. As for Lloyd George, he was not only
fortified by an overwhelming majority but actually embar-
rassed by the demands of the multitude for the unsparing
punidiment of the guilty. So far from these national
leaders thrusting forward upon their own impulse a ruth-
less claim against the defeated, they were every one of
them in danger of censure for lukewarmness. The Parlia-
ments and Press of every country stood vigilant to detect
the slightest symptoms of tender-heartedness or philosophic
indifference. Even the prestige which sprang from abso-
lute victory did not protect them from constant scrutiny
cind suspicion. In every victorious State there rose the cry :
‘ Our soldiers have won the war ; let us make sure our
politicians do not throw away the peace.’ These European
leaders represented their democracies best in all in which
they differed from President Wilson most.

And where was he ? He had pledged and was about to
recommit the United States to the service of mankind.
‘ We have no selfish ends to serve. We desire no conquest,
no dominion. We seek no indemnities for ourselves, no
material compensation for the sacrifices we shall freely
make. We are but one of the champions of mankind. We
diall be satisfied when those rights have been made as secure
as the faith and the freedom of nations can make them.' ^
And again, on the deck of the George Washington to Mr. Creel :
' It is to America that the whole world turns to-day, not
^Speedi, April 2, 1917.

THE PEACE CONFERENCE

127

only with its wrongs, but with its hopes and grievances. The Coa-
The hungry expect us to feed them, the roofless look to
us for shelter, the sick of heart and body depend upon us for
cure. All of these expectations have in them the quality
of terrible mgency. There must be no delay. . . . Yet
you know, and I know, that these ancient wrongs, these
present unhappinesses, are not to be remedied in a day or
with a wave of the hand. What I seem to see — ^with all my
heart I hope that I am wrong — ^is a tragedy of disappoint-
ment.’ ^

The misgiving was justified. The American populace
fell as far diort of their Chief in disinterested generosity
to the world, as the peoples of the Allied countries exceeded
their own leaders in severity to the enemy. The President
himsdf was without a majority both in the Senate and in
the newly elected Congress. Already Ex-President Roose-
velt had brutally proclaimed, ‘ Our Allies and our enemies
and Mr. Wilson himself should all understand that Mr.

Wilson has no authority whatever to speak for the American
people at this time.’ Much lower and cruder views
than his were to prevail on both sides of the Atlantic.

The Allies were destined to settle their affairs among
themselves. The agreements to which President Wilson
sought to commit the United States, for which the Allies
would be asked to concede many grave things, were to be
swiftly repudiated by the American Senate and electors.

After immense delays and false hopes that only aggravated
her difficulties, Europe was to be left to soramble out of
the world disaster as best she could ; and the United
States, which had lost but 125,000 lives in the whole
struggle, was to settle down upon the basis of receiving
through one channel or another four-fifths of the repara-
tions paid by Germany to the countries she had devastated or
whose manhood she had slain.

To write thus is not to blame peoples or their leading men.

It is only to recognize the comparatively low levd upon
which the intercourse of vast communities can proceed at
the present stage in human devdopment. How could the

1 The War, the World and Wilson, by George Creel, p.

163.

128 THE WORLD CRISIS: the aftermath

The ' Plain peoples know ? Through what channel could they receive

People.' instruction? What choate and integral conviction

could they form ? How could they express it ? Vague,
general ideas, some harsh, some noble, attracted them from
day to day. But in the main they were so glad the war had
stopped that each individual family was thinking of nothing
so much as reunion, and building up again the home, the
business, the old life. Wilson created world democracy in
his own image. In fact, however, the ‘ plain people ’ of
whom he spoke so much, though very resolute and per-
severing in war, knew nothing whatever about how to
make a just and durable peace. ‘ Punish the Germans,'
‘No more War,’ and ‘Something for our own country,’
above all ‘ Come Home,’ were the only mass ideas then
rife.

If Wilson had been either simply an idealist or a caucus
politician, he might have succeeded. His attempt to run
the two in double harness was the cause of his tmdoing.
The spacious philanthropy which he exhaled upon Europe
stopped quite sharply at the coasts of his own coimtry.
There he was in every main decision a party politician,
calculating and brazen. A tithe of the fine principles
and generous sentiments he lavished upon Europe,
applied during 1918 to his Republican opponents in the
United States, would have made him in truth the leader
of a nation. His sense of proportion operated in separate
water-tight compartments. The differences in Europe
between France and Germany seemed trivial, petty, easy
to be adjusted by a little good sense and charity. But the
differences between Democrat and Republican in the
United States ! Here were really grave quarrels. - He could
not understand why the French should not be more for-
giving to their beaten enemy ; nor why the American
Republicans should not expect cold comfort from a
Democratic Administration. His gaze was fixed with equal
earnestness upon the destiny of mankind and the fortunes of
his party candidates. Peace and goodwill among all nations
abroad, but no truck with the Republican Party at home.
That was his ticket and that was his ruin, and the ruin of
much else as well. It is difficult for a man to do great

THE PEACE CONFERENCE

129

things if he tries to combine a lambent charity embracing
the whole w^orld with the sharper forms of populist party
strife.

iie « afc 4t :ic

The first shock which the President and his Delegation
is said to have received was confrontation with the secret
Treaties made between the Allies during the war. Mr. Baker
in lurid pages has gloated upon their unmoral character.

‘ The old diplomacy — ^What it stood for ’ ; ' The Secret
Treaties ’ ; ‘ The Turkish Empire as booty ' ; ' The Slump in
Idealism/ form the headings of chapters which reveal
to the American public European baseness and their own
correctitude. But let us see what had actually occurred.
The Am erican thesis after the United States entered the
war was that the Germans represented the most violent
form of military aggression recorded by history. England
and France had been fighting against this monster since
August 4, 1914. In the spring of 1915 Italy had shown a
disposition to come and help them. The accession to their
side of a nation of thirty-five millions mobilizing an army
one and a half millions strong seemed to be a matter of the .
highest consequence. But Italy appeared to have a move
either way ; and the Germans were eagerly displaying to
Italian eyes the advantages to Italy of playing a true part
in the Triple Alliance. Instead of seeking the Trentino
from Austria, why not take Savoy from France ? And so
on ; bid and counter-bid. We should wrong the Italians
by suggesting' that .their decision was taken on these
material grounds. But who can blame the Allied statesmen
for dwelling upon the superior advantages which Italy
could obtain at the expense of Austria and of Turkey?
The Treaty of London, upon which Italy entered the war-
on the Allied side, embodied the belief that to France and
Britain the aid of Italy spelt speedy victory, and that her
hostility might mean their total defeat.

In the same way Roumania, who had equally great
prizes to gain by adhering to either combination pro-vided
it emerged -victorious, -was the subject in 1916 of every
form of threat and inducement which States at desperate
leaguer could present. Such were the secret Treaties

I

The Secret
Treaties.

Under

Duress*

130 THE WORLD CRISIS: the aftermath

entered into by the AUies in their distress and jeopardy
in order to secure reinforcements.

Another series of secret agreements had been made among
the Allies themselves— to keep themselves in good temper
•with each other. In 1914, 1915 and 1916 Russian assist-
ance was vital. France was bleeding to death ; the British
armies were only just becoming a prime factor in the field.
To keep the struggling Russian Colossus in good heart, to
avoid aH excuses for estrangement, was the first duty of
British and French diplomacy. Turkey, which had been
offered territorial integrity on the guarantee of France,
Britain and Russia, had joined the Germans and had made
an unprovoked assault upon Russia. No one was going to
shed many tears about the break-up of the Turkish Empire
or the end of Turkish domination over Christian or Arab
races. The assigmnent of spheres of interest over the
non-Turkish pro-vlnces of Turkey became at once a neces-
sity and a convenience to the Allies. England, abandoning
the policy of generations, consented to the prospect of a
Russian Constantinople and dwelt upon her own interests
in the Persian Gulf and in Mesopotamia. France asserted
her historic claims to Syria. Italy was assured that none
of her Allies would obstruct her ambitions in Adalia nor
indeed upon the Alps and in the Adriatic. An understanding
about Persia had for many years been an indispensable
foundation of good Anglo-Russian relations. These arrange-
ments had to be recast on the assumption of a general
■victory in which the Turkish Empire would have disap-
peared. Mr. Baker pretends that all these inter-AUied
agreements represented the inherent cynical wickedness and
materialism of old-world diplomacy. They were in the
main simply con-vulsive gestures of self-preservation.

The greater part of these secret Treaties was found to
be conformable to the principles laid down by President
Wilson in his Fourteen Points and •was consented to by
him in the ultimate settlement. There were features in
all of them which nothing but duress could explain and
excuse; but Mr. Baker and the United States Delegation
had no groxmds for taking a lofty and judicial view of
these transactions. If the United States had entered

THE PEACE CONFERENCE 131

the war — a. war, as they subsequently described it, of
right and justice against unspeakable wrong and t3uranny
— on the 4th of August, the world would never have
come into this plight. American statesmen could have
judged for themselves in concert with the ministers of
England, France, and Russia what conditions, if any,
might fittingly be offered to procure the adherence of
Italy. If the United States had entered the war after
the sinking of the Lusitania, they could have judged for
themselves how far it was right to go to prevent Roumania
being drawn into the orbit of the Central Powers. If even
two years after the outbreak of war they had joined the
Allies, they could have regulated at their pleasure any
arrangements made with Japan about Shantung and China
generally. One has a right to stand on the bank ; but if
one has exercised the right for a prolonged and agonizing
period without even throwing a rope to a man struggling
in the rapids, some allowance should be made for the
swinamer who now clutches at this rock and now at that
in rough or ungainly fashion. It is not open to the cool
bystander, who afterwards becomes the loyal and ardent
comrade and brave rescuer, to set himself up as an impartial
judge of events which never would have occurred had he
outstretched a helping hand in time.

Mr. Baker produces his first film tableau when he
shows us the hearty, whole-souled American Delegation
suddenly confronted on their arrival with this ' labyrinth ’
of secret Treaties. The President had never heard of their
existence. Mr. Lansing, with all the resources of the State
Department at his disposal, had never dreamed of them.
But here they were, naked and horrible, now flung on the
table of the Peace Conference and blotting the feiir lay-out
of the Fourteen Points. Can we wonder that the moral
sense of the American people recoiled ? No such effect
had been produced since Fatima opened the secret chamber
of Bluebeard.

In fact, however, the Government of the United States
(we cannot speak for individuals) had been made aware
of the gist of eadi of these secret Treaties, and could at
any time after their entry into the war have obtained every

The Dis-
closure.

132 THE WORLD CRISIS: the aftermath

The True detail by merely asking. Most remarkable of all, in their
memorable despatch of November 29, 1918, the French
Government as we have seen had formally proposed
to the American State Department that all secret
agreements should be abrogated forthwith before any
Peace negotiations were begun. And Mr. Lansing had
left this note without an answer. But here Mr. Baker
shall speak for himself. He speaks very fairly.

' ... In America we knew little and cared less about
these European secret Treaties. Our national interests
were at no point affected by them. . . . Everyone knew
indeed that Italy had driven a hard bargain when she came
into the War on the side of the AUies. But this was war,
and in war anything may be necessary. . . . Even the
State Department of the United States, which is the organi-
zation especially charged with the duty of knowing about
foreign affairs, seems to have had no interest in these secret
Treaties, and if Secretary Lansing is to be believed, little
or no knowledge of them. . . . While the President must
have known in general of these secret agreements, for he
often excoriated the practice of " secret diplomacy,” he
apparently made no attempt to secure any vital or compre-
hensive knowledge. . . .’

‘ . . . When Mr. Balfour came to Washington as the
British Commissioner in 1917 he explained certain of these
Treaties to Col. House. Col. House, however, said he was
not particularly interested, because it seemed to him more
important to bend all energies to the winning of the war ;
and he finally told Mr. Balfour that they were " dividing
the bearskin before the bear had been killed.” The Presi-
dent’s advisers thus underestimated the importance of the
whole matter, and felt that to waste any time on it would
only interfere with the energetic prosecution of the war,
which they believed was the most important consideration
of the moment. They trusted, as did the whole country,
that aU would come right in the end once we had “ Ecked
the Kaiser.” . . .’

• • • « •

' If our diplomatic service lacked a background of
comprdh.ension of the significance of the secret Treaties,
what ^ould be said about public opinion ? Venturing into
a totally unfamiliar scene, driven bhndly by a blast of war
feding, a few leaves of secret engagements in the wind
meant absolutely nothing to it, . .

THE PEACE CONFERENCE

133

But surely all this was masculine good sense. And if
these excuses for carelessness or indifference are valid for
the United States Government and people, how much
more do they protect the Allies ? If America can be par-
doned for being ' driven blindly by a blast of war feeling ’
into underrating or ignoring the significance of sudi trans-
actions, surely England and France, streaming with blood,
seared in the flame of battle, with their dearest dead and
national life at stake, may be excused for setting them
in a similar twilight.

It is at once siUy and unjust to pretend that these
partitions of possible war gains had any substantial relation
to the causes for which the AUies were fighting the war.
When wars begin, much is added to the original cause of
quarrel and many results follow never aimed at or cared
for at the beginning. When the United States in 1898
declared war upon Spain, it was with no thought of taking
the Philippine Islands and subjugating the Philippine
Islanders ; yet both these events followed inevitably or
incidentally from their victory. It is no less a calumny
upon France and England to say that they fought ‘ for
the booty of Turkey ’ than to say that the United States
picked a quarrel with Spain in order to annex and
conquer the Philippines ; and it is perhaps a good thing
to dear these calumnies out of the way even if it somewhat
mars the film effects in which Mr. Stannard Baker delights.
However, here were the secret Treaties to which the faith
of great coimtries was pledged and their signatures
appended ; and they ran criss-cross, not in the main, but in
some important instances, to the broad and simple theories
of the Fourteen Points.

in nt * * *

Mr. Lloyd George and the British Peace Delegation had
crossed the Channel on January 10. They were accompanied
by naval and military authorities. They had been preceded
by a large and elaborate staff of experts and officials who
filled to overflowing one of the largest hotels in Paris. The
competence of this staff, the fund of knowledge of histoiy,
law and economics which it commanded, and its methods
of conducting business have gained the respect both of Ally

The Defence
of the
Allies.

134 the world CRISIS: the aftermath

The British and enemy observers. ‘ As for the slim white booklets of

Dde^atioii. the English experts/ says a German writer, ‘ dealing with
Belgian neutrality, with the Rhine problem, with the
Danube, with the possible future of little Luxemburg,
and Heaven knows what besides, the number of these books
was legion. Of all the rival guides to the maze of the
troubled earth which awaited reshaping, the English collec-
tion was the amplest and was generally felt to be more
systematically and concisely arranged than either the
American or the French. Even members of the American
and French delegations frequently consulted the little white
books in their search for enlightenment on obscure subjects
on which they were called upon to pronounce or prophesy.' ^

The great machine was directed and focussed for business
by the comparatively small instrument of the War Cabinet
Secretariat which had been perfected during the preceding
four years by the organizing insight and measureless industry
of Maurice Hankey. This officer of Marines, while still a
young Captain, had become in 1912 the Secretary of the
Committee of Imperial Defence. He had been responsible
for the War Book which had been the key /o the whole
transition of Britain from peace to war in 1914. He had kept
and arranged the records of aU the great business which had
come first before the War Committee of the Cabinet and
later before the War Cabinet during the war and the
Armistice. He knew everything ; he could put his hand
on anything ; he knew everybody ; he said nothing ; he
gained the confidence of all ; and finally he became by
the natural flow of their wishes the sole recorder for the
decisive six weeks of the conversations between President
Wilson, M. Clemenceau and Mr. Hoyd George by which
the Peace was settled.

The British Plenipotentiaries were reinforced by the
British Empire Delegation consisting of the Prime Ministers
of the self-governing Dominions, the representatives of
India, and four or five Ministers in charge of the great
executive Departments, of whom I was at this time one.
This body was purely consultative. It assembled in Paris
only when required by the Prime Minister, and its members
1 ITowak, Versailles, p. 34.

THE PEACE CONFERENCE

135

were widely dispersed in other activities. In contrast to Tte British
President Wilson’s isolation from the Senate, it was Lloyd oSe^on.
George’s policy to fortify himself at important moments
by the counsel and agreement of the leaders of the whole
British Empire. This was his Senate, and he moved through
the darkness and confusion of the Paris firmament always
surrounded by numerous and shining satellites. At his
side, with matchless experience and a calm imperturbable
wisdom, stood Arthur Balfour ; and (must we not add ?)

Louis Botha. Were Labour questions raised, Barnes, the
veteran Trade Unionist, could speak as a working man.

Did he require exponents of the Liberal creed in inter-
national affairs. General Smuts and Lord Robert Cecil could
meet President Wilson on his own ground and speak his
language to Wilson’s surprise and gratification. Was there
a moment when the robust instincts of youthful conquering
pioneer states deserved expression, Mr. Hughes of Australia
and Mr. Massey of New Zealand were at hand, with Sir
Robert Borden of Canada not far away. If the panorama
of the East or Middle East should be lighted, Maharajas and
Emirs of a thousand years’ historic descent advanced in
glittering gravity. Himself singularly free from that per-
version of the historic sense which degenerates into egotism,
the Prime Minister parcelled out great functions and occasions
among his colleagues and those whom he wished to persuade
or conciliate ; and by modesty in good fortune preserved
intact his own controlling power. Thus he was well fitted
in himself for the impending ordeal and equipped with
a fine apparatus.

On the other hand he reached the Conference somewhat
dishevelled by the vulgarities and blatancies of the recent
General Election. Pinned to his coat-tails were the posters,

‘ Hang the Kaiser,’ ' Search their Pockets,’ ‘ Make them
Pay ’ ; and this sensibly detracted from the dignity of his

entrance upon the scene.

*****

The actors had arrived : the stage was set : and the
audience already clamoured for the curtain to rise. But
the play and its method of presentation were still unsettled.

We have seen how President Wilson had rejected the

136 THE WORLD CRISIS : the aftermath

The Com- original French plan of November 29, 1918, for a pre-

the^Confer- Hminary settlement upon essentials by the four or five

ence. principal partners in the war, and how he had wished

for a general assembly of the victors, over which he should

himself preside and before which he could lay his schemes
for the better government of mankind. His mere unspoken
dissent from the French proposals had been sufiicient to
delay all prior consultation between the Allied Powers.
But now everyone met face to face and practical decisions
must forthwith be taken. The President came immediately
into contact with personalities who were certainly his
equals in force and experience, and who guarded the
vital interests of mighty nations which in the long-
drawn-out struggle had staked their all and won. The
glowing if nebulous ideas he may have cherished of
haranguiug the Old World into a nobler way of life and
of marsh alling to his support — ^if necessary over the heads
of their own chosen leaders — ^the public opinions of the
various countries, must now give place to silk and steel
conversations with Clemenceau and Lloyd George.

From January 12 onwards meetings were held of the five
principal Powers, each with two representatives. These
meetings were at first intended only to settle procedure
and inaugurate the Plenary Conference ; but as they suc-
ceeded one another day after day, the body assumed an
impressive shape and came almost at once to be called
‘ The Council of Ten.’

The Council of Ten first discussed the constitution of
the Peace Conference and its control. Wilson was in
favour of the whole twenty-seven States meeting together
upon more or less equal terms. Clemenceau demurred :

'Am I to understand from the statement of President
Wilson that there can be no question, however important
it may be for France, England, Italy or America, upon
which the representative of Honduras or of Cuba shall not
be called upon to express his opinion ? I have hitherto
always been of the opinion that it was agreed that the five
Great Powears should reach their decisions upon important
questions before entering the halls of Congress to nego-
tiate peace. If a new war should take place, Germany
would not throw all her forces upon Cuba or upon Honduras,

THE PEACE CONFERENCE

137

but upon France ; it would always be upon France. I
request then that we stand by the proposals which have
been made, proposals to the effect that meetings be held
in which the representatives of the five countries mentioned
shall pcirtidpate, to reach decisions upon the important
questions, and that the study of secondary questions be
turned over to the commissions and the committees before
the reunion of the Conference.’

He was supported by Mr. Lloyd George, and evidently
commanded the agreement of Italy and Japan. Lansing
thought that Wilson should insist. He contemplated appa-
rently the President forming a block or lobby of small States
and out-votmg the Great Powers. Wilson’s inherent good
sense saved him from this folly. He proposed as a com-
promise that informal conversations should be held among
the Great Powers simultaneously with the Plenary Confer-
ences of all the nations. This was no compromise at all.
It was a recognition of facts. The Council of Ten were to
converse and not to confer, but they were to continue.
This was readily agreed to.

The next problem was the Press. No less than five
hundred special correspondents had gathered in Paris —
the most able, competent writers in every country, repre-
senting the most powerful newspapers and the largest
circulations. The sense of history was strong upon all of
these men, and also the importance of getting it in first.
Every day the cables and the wireless had to be charged
with tens of thousands of words directed to every printing
office in the globe, describing how the great peace was
going to be made. Except from the French Press, which
was carefully looked after, all the gag of war censorship
had been removed. The whole five hundred stood together
in the truest comradeship and the keenest rivalry ; and all
chanted aloud in chorus the first of the Fourteen Points
which seemed specially drafted for their benefit, namely,
‘ Open covenants of peace openly arrived at.’ Mr. Wilson
was seriously embarrassed at this application of his doc-
trine. He hastened to repeat that he had not intended
that every delicate matter must at every stage be discussed
in the newspapers of the world. Obviously one had to
draw the line somewhere. But this made no impression.

President

Wilson's

Compromise*

138 THE WORLD CRISIS: the aftermath

The Press. The people of the United States must have news, or at
least copy, day by day ; and the British and French could
scarcely be expected to be fed only through American
channels. The great question wzls, said Mr, Stannard
Baker, ‘ What would democracy do with diplomacy ? '
On the one hand, one himdred miUion strong, stood
the young American democracy. On the other cowered
furtively, but at the same time obstinately, and even
truculently, the old European diplomacy. Here young,
healthy, hearty, ardent millions, advancing so hopefully to
reform mankind. There, shrinking from the lime-lights,
cameras and cinemas, huddled the crafty, cunning, in-
triguing, high-collared, gold-laced diplomatists. Tableau I
Curtain! Slow music! Sobs : and afterwards chocolates !

‘ Open covenants of peace openly arrived at ! ’ If this
meant anything it surely meant a vast world debate upon
the war settlement ; and that all the ‘ plain people ’ in
all the lands, the plain blacks as well as the plain whites,
should consciously and intelligently participate in the
grand solution. But how to bring this about ? The
p lain people were busy getting their daily bread. They
had no time to listen to all the frantic pleadings and protests
which arose. One tale was good until another was told,
and probably both were untrue and certainly very difficult
to understand. Neverthless, here were the plain people
represented by a highly coloured Press ; and here was Point
One of the Fourteen, which said that the covenants of
peace were to be ‘ openly arrived at.’

However it is curious that the Press fared a good deal
worse in the peace than they had in the war. In fact
their fortunes were unexpectedly reversed. They had begun
the war brushed contemptuously aside by the Generals,
excluded from the war zone, and strait-jacketed by the
Censorship. They had soon compelled generals and
politicians to come to heel. They emerged from the war
at the highest point of their power and influence. They
were still in the mood to break: Governments and dictate
policy. But war conditions had passed; and as the
Parliaments and the platform revived, the newspapers
and their proprietors were gradually brought to a more

THE PEACE CONFERENCE

139

reasonable view of tbeir function. Their first experience
of the horrors of Peace was to leam that none of the
Fourteen Points applied to them ; and that the Council of
Ten would meet in secret.

i|c 4c 3|e 4b ak

A discussion at times rather heated then took place upon
what was to be the official language. France claimed that
French was by long custom the official language of diplomacy,
that the French were the hosts of the Conference and that
France had suffered more than anyone else. Britain, with
her Dominions, and the United States, all acting together,
said as opportunity offered that they represented a hundred
and sixty millions of English-speaking people and were
in a large majority. Neither side would agree to abate
its claims, so both languages were declared official ; and
an Italian attempt for the recognition of a third language
was not successful. The way was then clear for business ;
and on January 18 the first Plenary session of the Peace
Conference opened.

It was time. More than two months had passed since
the Armistice. The interval had been filled by the British
General Election, by President Wilson's journey to Europe
and by the French preparations — certainly not rmduly
hurried — for the greatest international gathering that has
ever taken place. Meanwhile the armies had advanced
into Germany and taken possession of the Rhine bridgeheads.
Allied officers and missions, clad in the brand-new authority
of conquest, had moved freely about through Austria, Turkey
and Bulgaria, giving such directions as they thought necessary
or thought fit to these entirely submissive populations. The
French, with the Greeks at their side, had landed at Odessa
(of which more later). Biitidi divisions had occupied the
railway across the Caucasus, and British flotillas rode the
Caspian as well as the Rhine. AUenby’s armies had effec-
tively occupied all Syria and joined hands with the Anglo-
Indian armies in Mesopotamia. But these purely military
measures, although for the moment they seemed effective,
only masked the deepening chaos in which so many vast
defeated conunimities were involved. The greater part of
Europe and Asia simply existed locally from day to day.

The Official
Language.

140 THE WORLD CRISIS: the aftermath

Revolutions, disorders, the vengeance of peoples upon rulers
who had led them to their ruin, partisan warfare, brigandage
of all kinds and — over wide areas — actual famine lapped
the Baltic States, Central and Southern Europe, Asia Minor,
Arabia and all Russia in indescribable confusion. These
were fearful months for a large proportion of mankind;
nor was the end in sight.

But behind these tribulations new and often inordinate
hopes and ambitions everywhere reared their heads. The
Baltic States sought their independence, and each strove
desperately to erect some form of ordered government.
Germany was in actual revolution. A Communist uprising,
eventually choked in blood, taught Munich a lesson never
to be forgotten. Hungary was soon to fall under the oppres-
sion of Bela Klin, an offshoot of the Moscow fungus sprout-
ing independently at Buda-Pesth. The Austrian Empire
was in utter dissolution. Poland was rising again out of
the wreck of the three Empires by whom she had been
partitioned a hundred and fifty years before. Bohemia,
under the shield of Masaryk and Benes, was accepted as an
ally by the victors. The remnants of Roumanian society
and army which had straggled back to their devastated
cotmtry after the withering Treaty of Bucharest, now
rapidly overran Transylvania. The Italians poured into
the Tyrol, and passing the Adriatic soon came face to face
with fierce, gaunt, unconquerable Serbs who now called
themselves Yugo-Slavs. The Arabs under Feisal, with the
fiery Lawrence bormd in blood brotherhood to their cause,
had settled doAvn in Damascus and dreamed of a great Arabia
from Alexandretta to Aden, and from Jerusalem to Bagdad.
Not only the victors but the vanquished, not only the
peoples but parties and classes, proclaimed their ambitions.
Appetites, passions, hopes, revenge, starvation and anarchy
ruled the hour ; and from this simultaneous and almost
universal welter all eyes were turned to Paris. To this
immortal city— gay-tragic, haggard-triumphant, scarred
and crowned — more than half mankind now looked for
satisfaction or deliverance.

CHAPTER VIII

THE LEAGUE OF NATIONS

Three Phases — Defective Procedure — ^The Supreme Council —
A Dual Association — ^The League of Nations Commission
— Origin of the Covenant — ^The British Contribution — Scep-
ticism — ^The President’s Credentials — ^The Question of Mandates
— ^The Dominions’ View — ^The President and the Dominions
Prime Ministers — ^The Period of Commissions — ‘ Make them
Pay ’ — Mr. Keynes’s Book — ^The Solution — War Criminals —
The Ladder of Responsibility — ^The Kaiser — Growing Impatience
— ^The Covenants Achieved — ^The Foundation Stone.

T he story of the Peace Conference divides itself
naturally into three well-inarked phases which the
reader would do well to keep in mind as the narrative
proceeds.

First, the Wilson period, or the period of Commissions
and of the Council of Ten, culminating in the drafting of
the Covenant of the League of Nations. This lasted for a
month, from the first meeting of the Council of Ten on
January 14 down to the first return of President Wilson to
America on February 16. Secondly, the Balfour period,
when President Wilson had returned to Washington and
Mr. Lloyd George to London, and when M. Clemenceau was
prostrated by the bullet of an assassin. In this period
Mr. Balfour, in full accord with Mr. Lloyd George, induced
the Commissions to abridge and terminate their ever-
spreading labours by March 8 and concentrated all attention
upon the actual work of making peace. Thirdly, the Trium-
virate period, when the main issues were fought out by
Lloyd George, Clemenceau and Wilson in the Council of
Four and finally alone together. This Triumvirate, after
tense daily discussions lasting for more than two months,
framed preliminaries of peace which were accepted by
ah the Allied States great and small and then presented to

141

Three

Phases.

A Defective
Procedure.

14a THE WORLD CRISIS: the aftermath

the enemy in the Treaties of Versailles, St. Germain,
Trianon, and NeuiUy.

To understand the Conference the reader must grasp
both the procedure and how it arose. The logical French
scheme of November 29 had not been accepted by President
Wilson. Nevertheless there was general if tacit agreement
that in the first instance the victors should meet together
alone. They wotild then draw up preliminary peace terms,
and after thra shin g these out among themselves would
present draft treaties unitedly to the enemy. The French
had proposed and the British, Italians and Japanese ex-
pected that from among the victors the leaders of the five
Great Powers would confer privately beforehand and would
settle all the largest questions and principles among them-
selves before the crowd of small states were admitted to
the discussion. However, except for the questions of
procedure mentioned in the last chapter, this all-important,
and as it proved indispensable stage never had its proper
place. The main Conference overlapped and overlaid the
vital preparatory discussions. The first Plenary Session of
January 18 saw the whole twenty-seven States represented
and no agreement on any fundamental matter among the
five principal Allied Powers.

Of course the five Great Powers from the beginning to
the end settled ever3rthing as they chose; and nothing
could have prevented them from doing so. But these
primordial facts only became apparent and dominant after
a prolonged period of uncertainty and confusion. Decisions
were taken not as the result of systematized study and
discussion, but only when some individual topic reached
a condition of crisis. Throughout there was no considered
order of priority, no thought-out plan of descending from
the general to the particular. All sorts of thorny,
secondary questions were discussed and fought over by
chiefs who had not agreed upon the primary foundations.
There was no mutual confidence between the five Great
Powers, and no achievement of a common point of view.
Two months of discussion took place while aU the burning
issues were hidden in the breasts of the leading pleni-
potentiaries. In fact, so far as I have been able to

THE LEAGUE OF NATIONS

143

ascertain, right down to the end of March there never The Supreme
was any heart-to-heart and frank conversation between the
three men on whom ultimately everything rested: Mr.

Lloyd George, M. Clemenceau and President Wilson. This
is the dominating fact of the Wilson and Balfour stages.

These chiefs were, however, continually in official con-
tact. Not only were there frequent sessions called ‘ con-
versations ’ of the Council of Ten, but the same men (or
some of them) often sat together as the Supreme War
Council. ^ This instrument had reached a very high develop-
ment during the concluding months of the war. The meet-
ings of the Supreme War Council were not concerned with
the terms of peace. Many practical and urgent matters
pressed upon them from week to week : for instance, the
whole economic situation ; the continuance of the terms of
the Armistice ; the relations with Russia. And then from
time to time the disorders of Europe rose to explosion-point.

The newly founded Republic of Poland found itself in a state
of war with the people of East Galicia ; and the Supreme
War Council had to interfere. They sent out a special Com-
mission to Poland, and we saw the spectacle of an inter-
national train starting on an adventurous journey with its
five heavily guarded carriages each for a separate nation.

In spite of hazards the international Commission reached
Warsaw and patched up some kind of truce between the
Poles and the Ukrainians. Then similar difficulties arose
in Teschen, The Allies had to intervene to prevent the
outbreak of fighting between the Poles and the Czecho-
slovaks. In April again they had to intervene in conse-
quence of the Bolshevik revolution of Bela Kun in Hungary
and the great dangers which it involved. The situation
was indeed difficult and dangerous in the last degree.

There was serious peril that the whole continent might
lapse into anarchy. Everyone turned to the principal
Allies, looking for help ; but in many cases the help could
not be given. They wanted food, but there was still a
shortage of food even in the Allied countries. They wanted
military occupations ; but the British, whose soldiers were
in the greatest demand as pacifiers, could not spare many
^ The word ‘war’ was gradually dropped.

144 the world CRISIS: the aftermath

A Dual troops and cotild not risk sending small detachments to

Association, districts far from the sea. All these consequential

war measures occupied during the first months much of
the time and the energy of the principal Powers.

This dual association exercised an irresistible effect upon
the rnaking of the Peace. The five Great Powers found
themselves continually together for one cause or another.
In the morning they ' conversed ' as a Council of Ten about
the Peace settlements ; in the afternoon they sat as a
Supreme Council taking important executive decisions.
The rest of the twenty-seven States, who according to the
fiction originally adopted were of equal status, were from
time to time assembled in Plenary Sessions where under
conditions of the fullest publicity nothing of any importance
could ever be done. President Wilson yielded himself
inevitably and almost insensibly to these developments.
He saw that they did not arise from the evil nature of
European diplomacy, but from practical and physical
causes against which it was vain to strive. How could any
thorny question affecting the main interests of nations,
great or small, be helpfully debated by twenty-seven Powers
in public ? If platitudes and honeyed words alone were
used, the proceedings would be a farce. If plain speaking
were indulged in, they would become a bear-garden. Even
the Council of Ten, solely composed of the leading states-
men of the greatest Powers and meeting in secret, was too
unwieldy. With its attendant experts it rarely numbered
less than fifty persons of very various rank and status.
Even secrecy was doubtful, apart from calculated leakages.
We shall see the President presently, guided by common
sense and the force of facts, lock himself up with Clemenceau
and Lloyd George, and with only Maurice Hankey to record
and give precise shape to the decisions, settle every question
of crucial importance. If such meetings had taken place
in December or even in January, the whole course of the
Peace Conference would have been smooth and coherent.
He had begun by rejecting the obvious and the easy. He
welcomed them warmly when they returned to him upside
down after many days.

The moment at leiigth came for the President, to launch

THE LEAGUE OF NATIONS

145

his main policy. He declared -that a League of Nations The League
must become an integral part of the Treaty of Peace
and must have priority over all territorial or economic
settlements. It was upon the structure of the League that
the whole Treaty should be built, and with its general
principles all must be in harmony. This would have
been admirable if a preliminary understanding had been
reached on the main issues between the leading men,
and if they had known where they stood with one another
in essentials and had not felt that very serious conflicts
impended. But now it seemed that the Conference was to
dive into interminable academic discussions upon a new
Constitution for mankind, while all the practical and
clamant issues had to drum their heels outside the door.

It was agreed that a special Commission upon the Con-
stitution of the League of Nations should be appointed
by a Plenary Session of the Conference. The discussions
in the Council of Ten, at which this procedure was settled,
are instructive reading. President Wilson, hitherto the
champion of the smaller Powers, had already realized
that no business would be done if any large number
of them were allowed to sit upon the Commission of
the League. He therefore argued for the smallest
possible body composed of representatives of the highest
responsibility. Clemenceau and Lloyd George, on the
other hand, somewhat ironically voiced the claims of the
smallest nations. The League was to be their shield and
buckler. Ought they not to be there ? Would this not
open to them a useful sphere of activity instead of leaving
them to loaf morosely about Paris waiting for the decisions
of the Coimcil of Ten ? All the Great Powers except the
United States were profoundly disquieted at the total
lack of progress, and their representatives had to face a
rising menace of impatience at home. While the main
questions were unsettled, every aspect of the League of
Nations’ Constitution would have to be vigilantly scruti-
nized. They regarded with despair the prospect of so
many weeks’ or even months’ delay.

In the end a very good Commission was appointed
which included some of the smaller nations and yet was

K

146 THE WORLD CRISIS: the aftermath

Origin of not Tiiimanageable in numbers. The two foremost British
champions of the policy. Lord Robert Cecil ^ and General
Smuts, were appointed delegates. Wilson himself decided to
preside, and the immense task was vigorously taken in hand.

The history of the Peace Conference, edited by Dr.
Temperley and published under the auspices of the Institute
of Foreign Affairs, attributes the origin of the League of
Nations to three reasons. First, the need of some settled
Council of Nations which would be responsible for the main-
tenance of peace ; secondly, the need for a more compre-
hensive guarantee of the safety of small nations, as proved
by the fate of Belgium ; and thirdly, a growing belief
in the advcintages of economic co-operation. An additional
argument might be fotuid in the fact that twenty million
men had been blowing eadi other to pieces for more than
four years, that this process had now stopped, and most
people hoped it would not begin again.

It is sometimes pretended that the League of Nations
was an American inspiration forced and foisted upon Europe
against its froward inclination. The facts are different.
The idea had stirred in most civilized countries during the
last three years of the war, and various societies had been
formed to propagate it both in America and in England.
Lord Robert Cecil was the first Englishman to put some-
thing down in writing, and he wrote a paper on this subject
at the end of 1916. His thesis, though necessarily unde-
veloped, amounting indeed only to a rough draft of what
now forms Articles XV and XVI of the Covenant, provided
a basis for a Committee set up in 1917 under Lord Phflli-
more’s presidency to work upon. This Committee produced
draft statutes of a League in a document circulated to the
United States among other Governments early in 1918.
In the summer of 1918 President Wilson deputed Colonel
House to work upon the PhiUimore draft and House’s
suggestions reached him on July 16. The main addition
made by House was the positive guarantee of the territorial
integrity and independence of the States members of the
.League. PhiUimore's draft had been content merely to
provide guarantees for the execution of arbitration agree-
*Now Viscount Cecil of Chelwood.

THE LEAGUE OF NATIONS

147

ments. When Wilson came to revise this he omitted the The British
clause providing for an International court but added
tremendous words, indeed such words as Lord Robert Cecil
had advocated in his early draft, that violation should be
ptmished by lethal force.

Meanwhile General Smuts produced independently on
December 16, 1918, his own draft of a League which em-
bodied detailed suggestions of an organization, proposed
to set up a Council as weU as the Assembly, included a
provision for the abolishment of conscription and for the
limitation of military equipment and recommended a
mandatory system for backward territories or states in
tutelage.

Of Wilson’s share in the task his chronicler, Mr, Baker
says ‘ Practically nothing, not a single idea, in the covenants
of the League was original with the President. His relation
to it was mainly that of editor or compilist, selecting or
rejecting or compiling the projects which came in to him
from other sources.’ ^

This in no wise detracts from the magnitude of Wilson’s
contribution. He embodied all helpful amendments in
his own draft, and also added one draft Article designed
to ensure fair hours and humane conditions for labour, and
another requiring new States to grant equal rights to
minorities. This was the draft which the Americans pre-
sented on January 10, 1919, at the Peace Conference, and
ten days later the British Delegation also produced the
most up-to-date version of the British ideas on the subject.

The British and American drafts, which in all essentials
‘meant the same thing,’ were consohdated by Sir Cecil
Hurst representing Great Britain and Mr. Hunter Miller
the United States, They were considered and amended by
the League Commission during the latter part of January
and beginning of February, and eventually laid before
a Plenary Session of the Conference on February 14.

Thus the League of Nations was an Anglo-Saxon con-
ception arising from the moral earnestness of persons
of similar temperament pn both sides of the Atlantic.

President Wilson had made this great idea his own, and
iVol. I, p. 242.

Scepticism.

148 THE WORLD CRISIS: the aftermath

when all the vexations of these days and his own mistakes
are forgotten it is in the establishment and ascendancy of
a new international society that his memory will be en-
shrined. The British were throughout his chief supporters.
In our island all liberal elements dung and cling to the
plan All other right-minded persons realized the advan-
tages which such a League might confer upon the widely
dispersed communities of the British Empire. Criticism
arose only from scepticism. Was it not too good to be true ?
Could it be a substitute for national armaments ? Might
it not turn out in the hour of need to be an illusion and
those who had coimted on it perish in some future earth-
quake ? It seemed to these critics more prudent to. retain
the old proved safeguards while the new were a-building.
But the support given by Great Britain to President Wilson’s
League of Nations plan was whole-hearted, positive, and
above all, practical. Without it he could never have
succeeded. It was natural that the smaller or weaker
States of the world should acclaim a Reign of Law which
would protect them from overlordship or aggression. France
and Italy and, on the other side of the globe Japan, received
the new gospel with goodwill ; but being much closer
anchored to the grim realities, they reproduced in more
stubborn forms the misgivings of British sceptics. The real
opposition came from the United States. The whole tra-
dition of the American people had been separation from the
tribulations and antagonisms of the Old and Older Worlds.
The Atlantic pleaded three thousand and the Pacific seven
thousand reasons against entanglement in these far-off
affairs. All the teachings of the Fathers of the American
Union from Washington to Monroe had ingeminated
Non-intervention. Science has to march perhaps another
fifty years before the gulfs of ocean space are rendered
politically meaningless. This is no long period in human
history, but it far exceeded the life of the Paris Conference
in the Year of Grace 1919.

Moreover, as has been seen. President Wilson had taken
no measures to conciliate or disarm the inveterate and
natural aversion of his own countrymen. It weus as a
Party not as a National leader that he sought to rule the

THE LEAGUE OF NATIONS

149

United States and lecture Europe. His native foundations The
broke beneath him. While his arm was lifted in rebuke credentials,
of the embarrassed and respectful Governments of the old
world he was imceremoniously hauled out of the pulpit
by his hefty Party opponents at home. Some of the most
gifted Americans whom I have met — ‘ men of light and
leading’ — as thesapng goes, have said ‘ European politicians
ought to have understood the Constitution of the United
States. You ought to have known that the President
without the Senate could do nothing. You have only
yourselves to blame if you have suffered through counting
on his personal decisions or undertakings. They had no
validity.’

There were from the very beginning serious doubts about
the credentials of President Wilson. The supreme efficacy
of the League of Nations depended upon the accession of the
United States. Here was the great new external balancing
factor. Was it at the command of President Wilson ? If it
were not, no surge of Hberal sentiment in the various coun-
tries could replace it . It would, on the other hand, have been
highly imprudent to canvass his credentials. What would
have happened if, for instance, Lloyd George andClemenceau
had said across the table : ‘ We know we speak for the
overwhelming mass of our two countries. Test it any way
you will. But is it not true that nothing but your fixed
and expiring tenure of office prevents you from being
thrown out of power ? Your constitutional authority is
not complete. Where is the Senate of the United States ?

We are told that you have lost control both of the Senate
and Congress. Are you just a well-meaning philosopher,
eager to reform others ; or do you carry the faith and will
of the American nation ? ’ Probably the Americans would
have been deeply offended. They would have replied:

'You were glad enough to have our troops and money on
President Wilson's authority. Now that you are out of
your troubles you flout the supreme magistrate of the
Republic. Whatever Party we belong to, we resent that.

It is an insult to suggest that we shall not make good all
our imdertakings ; and in the face of that insult, we will
quit the scene.’ So no one questioned the President’s title.

150 THE WORLD CRISIS: the aftermath

Tte Questioix Morcovor, in spite of a h undr ed irritAtions 3nd Anxieties,

of Mandates. ^ underlying And true conviction in English

and French minds that he was the most forthcoming friend
of Europe who up to that moment had crossed the Atlantic.

The composition of the League of Nations Commission
was determined by a meeting of the Council of Ten
on January 22 and by a Plenary Session of the Peace
Conference on January 25. It began its labours on Feb-
ruary 2. But meanwhile an acute tension had developed
between Great Britain and the Dominions upon the question
of the mandatory principle in regard to conquered territory.
This principle owed its birth to General Smuts. Its applica-
tion has now to be extended to limits the General had not
contemplated. The theory that the conquered German
colonies, or parts of Turkey, would be held by the victors not
as their own property but in trust for all mankind under the
League of Nations and with formal international supervision
of the treatment of the natives seemed to meet all require-
ments. It was welcomed by President Wilson on the
highest grounds.

But the General had only intended it to apply to ex-
Russian, ex-Turkish or ex-Austro-Htmgarian territory.
He had never thought it suited to the regions conquered
in the course of the war by the various British Dominions.
Least of all had he expected it to be applied to the case
of German South-West Africa, which the Union Govern-
ment had occupied and intended to annex. This was
canying a sound principle too far. The self-Goveming
Dominions all took the view that the Mandatory principle
should not apply to the places they had taken.

The British Government could not be indifferent to
territorial gains. The nation looked for some compensa-
tion for its awful losses. As the result of long and costly
campaigns the British Armies held Palestine, Mesopotamia,
the Cameroons and German East Africa. The mandatory
system imposed no conditions which had not for many years
been strictly observed throughout the British Colonial Em-
pire. Alone among all the Colonial possessions of the Great
Powers, the immense tropical domains of the British Crown
had been free to the trade of all nations. The ^ps of all

THE LEAGUE OF NATIONS 151

countries used British Colonial ports as freely as their own.
There had never been any discrimination in favour of
British nationals. As for our treatment of the natives, we
had nothing to fear from fair International scrutiny. On the
contrary we were proud to explain and expose our system.

Mr. Lloyd George therefore stood forward at once and
declared the British acceptance of the mandatory principle
unreservedly for all territory which the British fleets and
armies had wrested from the Turks or the Germans. We
could not however speak for the self-governing Dominions.
Australia, New Zealand, South Africa were to us precious
entities from which we could not separate ourselves, but
which we could not control. Of course, the King was
supreme. Cession or annexation of territory like peace or
war resided in the Crown. But what Minister, except in the
face of unutterable wrong, would invoke this abstract and
almost mystic function against a beloved member of the
family ? Australia had captured New Guinea ; New
Zealand, Samoa; and the Union, German South-West
Africa. They did not mean to give them up. Nor ought
they to be pressed to do so. To speak of these places
as ‘ communities shoved hither and thither as pawns in
a diplomatic game ’ is an abuse of language. These terri-
tories, sparsely populated by primitive races, had been
part of the brand-new outfit of less desirable Colonies which
Great Britain had in the nineteenth century willingly seen
accorded to the growth of the German power. Every one
of them presented to each of these remote Dominions an
inroad upon their own Monroe Doctrine ; and every one
had been found to be a menace and the cause of bloodshed
in the recent conflict. They had taken them ; they would
not give them up. But their title-deeds did not depend on
local conquests. They were consecrated by sacrifice in
the common cause. These three Dominions, aggregating
together less than a twelfth of the white population of
the United States, had lost nearly as many lives on the
battlefields of Europe — six, deven or twdve thousand
miles from home — ^in a cause which the United States had
made its own. Whatever happened, we could not quarrel
with them.

The

Dominions

View.

The

President
and the
Dominions'
Prime
Ministers.

152 THE WORLD CRISIS: the aftermath

Accordingly, on January 23, Mr. Lloyd George introduced
to the Council of Ten the Prime Ministers of Canada,
Australia, New Zealand and South Africa. There they
stood, armed in the panoply of democracy, of war service,
and of young nationhood. Borden with wide Canada —
French and F-nglish — ^behind him ; Massey of New Zealand,
fearless and faultless in all that touched the common cause ;
Hughes the vibrant Australian Labour Premier ; the grand
and rugged Botha; the gifted, philosophical, persuasive
Smuts. There they stood, and with them stood not only
the modem age but the future. These figures and what
they represented were not to be lightly put aside. No
George the Third England this ; no smooth-phrased
European diplomatists ; no benighted Old World aristo-
crats ! Here were the Pilgrim Fathers, with tongues as
plain in speech and lands as vast to till. Wilson was not
unmoved by their insignia. This at any rate was not what
he had crossed the Atlantic to chastise. But he had his
cause to defend ; and it was a great one.

A jagged debate ensued. Australia, New Zealand and
South Africa said they meant to keep the colonies they
had taken from the Germans ; and Canada said she stood
with them. ‘And do you mean, Mr. Hughes,’ said the
President, ‘that in certain circumstances Australia would
place herself in opposition to the opinion of the whole
civilized world ? ’ Mr. Hughes, who was very deaf, had an
instrument like a machine gun emplaced upon the table
by which he heard all he wanted ; and to this challenge
he replied dryly, 'That’s about it, Mr. President.’ The
statesmanship of Borden and of Botha behind the scenes
eventually led the Dominion leaders to agree to veil their
sovereignty under the name at any rate of Mandate ; and
this Mr. Wilson was willing to accept.

This discussion had been very gratif3dng to M. Clemen-
ceau ; and for the first time he had heard the feelings of
his heart expressed with unbridled candour. He beamed
on Mr. Hughes, and punctuaied his every sentence with
unconcealable delight. ‘ Bring your savages with you,’ he
said to Mr. Lloyd George beforehand ; and to the Aus-
tralian, ‘ Mr. ’U^es, I have ’eard that in early life you

THE LEAGUE OF NATIONS

153

were a cannibal.’ ' Believe me, Mr. President,' said the
Commonwealth Prime Minister, ‘that has been greatly
exaggerated.' This day’s meeting was an event in the
proceedings of the Cormcil of Ten.

The Ten now entered the period — ^mdispensable but un-
definable — of Commissions. Here were the crucial ques-
tions, here were the real differences ; but first let us know
the facts. Accordingly Commissions were appointed. At
one time or another fifty-eight Commissions were formed
to find out all about everything ; and to enable the masters
of the world — if masters they remained — ^to decide wisely
and justly and tolerably how the maps of the world should
be redrawn and how its depleted riches should be appor-
tioned. In this domain the most effective step was probably
the creation as an executive department of the Supreme
Council of the Supreme Economic Council, to which was later
assigned for instance the feeding of Austria and all such
matters. Thus was averted in Vienna and elsewhere the
final catastrophe of mass deaths from starvation which
was otherwise imminent. But besides this vital executive
function. Commissions were set up in every sphere to prepare
proposals for the Treaty ; Commissions upon the Financial
Arrangements ; upon the Economic Clauses ; upon Repar-
ations ; upon the punishment of War Criminals and Hanging
the Kaiser ; upon all the territorial issues, the frontiers
of Poland, Roumania, Czecho-Slovakia, Yugo-Slavia ; upon
the future of Turkey and Arabia ; upon Colonies in Africa
and Asia and islands in the Pacific Ocean. In aU fifty-
ei^t Commissions, great and small, upon objects wise
or foolish!

Even at the cost of some anticipation of the narrative
it will be convenient to dispose of some of the less serious
of these topics at this stage.

« « 4c 41

We have seen to what extent Mr. Lloyd George had 3delded
to the newspaper and popular demand that he should use
the strongest language about ‘ Make them pay ’ ; and how
he had tried to do this while at the same time safeguarding
himself as far as possible by ‘ ifs ’ and ‘ buts.’ For instance,
in effect, ' They shall pay to the utmost farthing — ^if they

The Period
of Com-
missions.

154 THE WORLD CRISIS: the aftermath

' Make them can do SO without delaying the economic revival of the
world.’ Or, ‘ They shall pay the maximum possible — but
what is the maximum possible must be ascertained by
finanrial experts.’ When the Election was over and I had
asked the Prime Minister how he was going to meet the
expectations of the public that all the damage of the war
would be paid for by Germany, he had replied : ' It will
all have to be settled by an Inter-Allied Commission. We
will put on this Commission the ablest men we can find,
men not mixed up in politics or electioneering ; they will
examine the whole matter coolly and scientifically, and
they will report to us what is feasible.' Now that the time
had come, he chose Mr. Hughes, the Prime Minister of
Australia; Lord Cunliffe, the Governor of the Bank of
England; and Lord Sumner, one of the ablest judicial
authorities and greatest legal intellects at our disposal.

It was to be expected that the Inter-Allied Commission
with its powerful American element would reduce the
clamour of the election and the claptrap of the popular
press to hard matter-of-fact business. But the Com-
mission on Reparations was never able to reach agree-
ment. Lord Cunliffe’s Sub-Committee on capacity to
pay, which reported in April, cautiously avoided any
figure. The Governor hadbegim apparently to feel some
misgivings. At any rate he did not wish to be com-
mitted publicly. His Sub-Committee declared that the
factors were too fluctuating to render a forecast possible.
Enormous figures, however, still continued to rule in
authoritative circles. Mr. Lament, one of the American
representatives, has in a published article stated that
subject to certain important conditions, he was willing
to go as high as a capital sum of seven thousand five
hundred millions, that the French asked for ten thousand
millions, and that the British would not accept less than
twelve thousand. The Prime Minister was not therefore
ever to receive that substantial but at the same time
reasonable figure, vouched for by the highest authority,
of which he stood greatly in need. His various semi-
official conversations with the British representatives gave
him no comfort. They spoke alwa3rs in extremely opti-

THE LEAGUE OF NATIONS

155

mistic terms of German capacity to pay ; and on no occasion Mr. Keynes’s
was any lower figure mentioned than ;^8,ooo millions.

Invited formally on March 6 to name a figure ' on the
assumption that it was to be insisted on even at the point
of breaking off the Peace negotiations,’ they promised to
report separately by March 17. But of this report there
is no record. The oracle was mute ; and the embarrassed
Prime Minister was left to bear the burden himself with
the choice either of infuriating the public by mentioning
a low figure for which no authority could be cited or a high
figure which his instinct and reason alike convinced Mm
could never be obtained. So no figure of German Repar-
ations was fixed by the Allied and Associated Powers.

Other Commissions laboured upon the economic clauses
of the Peace, and whole chapters of the Treaty were filled
with provisions — mostly temporary in character — for making
sure that the trade of the Allies would be restarted ahead
of that of enemy countries. TMs separate work was never
brought into relation with the financial clauses. Thus the
draft Treaty imposed upon Germany at one and the same
time an unspecified and unlimited liability and every con-
ceivable impediment upon the means of payment, Mr.

Ke3mes, a mem of dairvo3rant intelligence and no undue
patriotic bias, was a member of the staff wMdi Great
Britain transported to Paris for the Peace Conference.

Saturated in the Treasury knowledge of the real facts,
he revolted against the absurd objectives wMch had
been proclaimed, and still more against the execrable
methods by wMch they were to be acMeved. In a book
wMch gained a vast publidty, particularly in the United
States, he exposed and denounced ‘ a Carthaginian
Peace.’ He showed in successive chapters of unanswer-
able good sense the monstrous character of the financial
and economic clauses. On aU these matters Ms opinion
is good. Carried away however by Ms natural indig-
nation at the economic terms wMch were to be solemnly
enacted, he wrapped the whole structure of the Peace
Treaties in one common condemnation. His qualifications
to speak on the economic aspects were indisputable ; but
^ The Economic Consequences of the Peace,

The Solu-
tion.

136 THE WORLD CRISIS : the aftermath

on the other and vastly more important side of the problem
he could judge no better than many others. The Ke3mes
view of the Peace of Versailles, justified as it was on the
special aspects with which he was acquainted, greatly
influenced the judgment of England and America on the
whole Settlement. It is however of high importance for
those who wi^ to understand what actually happened,
that the economic and general aspects of the Treaty of
Versailles should be kept entirely separate.

When Mr. Lloyd George was reproadhed or rallied in
private during the Peace Conference upon the economic and
financial clauses he was accustomed to make the following
answer : ‘ It is too soon to expect the peoples who have
suffered so much to regain their sanity. What does it
matter what is written in the Treaty about German pay-
ments ? If it caimot be carried out, it will fall to the
gromd of its own weight. We have to give satisfaction
to the view of the multitude who have endured such fright-
ful injuries. We will however insert in the Treaty clauses
which provide for the recurrent review of these provisions
after a few years have passed. It is no good fretting about
it now ; we must let them all calm down. All I am tr57ing
to do now is to insert the machinery of revision in the text
of the Treaty.’

This may not have been heroic, but it is very largely
what has come to pass. The main economic clauses of
the ‘ Carthaginian Peace ’ have either lapsed or have
been revised under the machinery provided in the Treaty ;
and in fact, the Dawes Agreement claims no more from
Germany than the 2,000/2,500 millions indenmity which
the well-instructed British Treasury mentioned as a
reasonable figure on the first occasion when their opinion
was invited.

* sfs * He

Another Commission laboured upon the punishment of
War Criminals. Horrible things had been done in the war,
and while it raged the fighting fury of millions had been
inflamed by the tale. The victors were now in a position
to lay down their own view of these events. Certainly
in military executions, in organized ‘ frightfulness ’ as

THE LEAGUE OF NATIONS

157

distinct from spontaneous or uncontrollable brutality in
actual fighting, the case was black against the Germans.
They had stood throughout the war on conquered soil.
The Allies had with difficulty defended their own invaded
lands. Germany had held for four years writhing popula-
tions in her grip. To British minds the execution of Edith
Cavell, and still more of Captain Fryatt, were crimes for
which somebody should be held rigorously accoimtable.
But France and Belgium had long and hideous indictments
to imfold. A thousand atrocious acts committed by pri-
vates, by sergeants, by captains, by the orders of generals,
marshalled behind them a cloud of witnesses. There were
also dark tales from the sea — not wholly one-sided ; but
here also was the German submarine campaign — ^sinking
merchant ships at sight ; and the Lusitania with some
munitions but also with its forty babies ; and hospital
ships with their hdpless, nerve-shattered patients and
faithful nurses, sinking and choking in the cold sea. This
found no counterpart in any of the reprisals, fierce and
ferocious as some of them were, which these deeds extorted
from seafaring men.

The conduct of the Bulgarians in Serbia excited the
extreme indignation of the investigators. As for Turkish
atrocities : marching till they dropped dead the greater
part of the garrison at Kut ; massacring uncounted
thousands of helpless Armenians, men, women, and children
together, whole districts blotted out in one administrative
holocaust — ^these were beyond human redress.

But a passionate demand arose in Belgium, France and
England that certain definite deeds, contrary to such laws
of war as men have tried to make and keep, should be
brought home to individuals. No one could deny that
this held justice. But how was it to be carried out ?
The submarine lieutenant could plead the orders of his
superiors ; these he had to obey upon his hfe. Whether
hospital ships should be sunk or not was a matter for
governments. A naval lieutenant could only do what he
was told. The executions had behind them whatever
sanctions the military tribunals of warring nations could
give. As for the brutality in the zone of the armies, obscure

War

Criminals.

158 THE WORLD CRISIS: the aftermath

The Ladder p6oplc coTild bc iiidic3.t6d who h3,d doQS vilc things , but

Responsi- t^ey Said they had not ; or alternatively, that their officers

bUity. had told to do it. The officers said they had not,
or would have said so if they could have been found. Or
thirdly, that they could match these incidents with others
done against themselves which they had seen and in respect
of which there was no lack of testimony.

Commissions were appointed to probe these matters.
Material was plentiful, but where lay the responsibility ?
The captain had ordered the platoon to fire the volley.
He had received his orders from the military governor.
The military governor had acted under the authority
accorded him by his commission. The corps commander
could say he obeyed the Army Group, and the Army Group
was but the servant of main Headquarters. Above all
was the German Government supported by the German
People, and at the summit, the Emperor, Led on by
logic the commission chmbed this ladder. How could
they condenm the sergeant or the captain for actions for
which the general bore responsibility? How could they
condemn the general when the Government and the Parlia-
ment had approved, or at least acquiesced ? So if anyone
was to be punished it must not be the small people, but
the big. Thus after months of toilsome argumentation,
a list was drawn up which included all the greatest men in
Germany ; aU the Army Commanders ; all the most
famous Generals ; most of the Princes ; and above all,
the Kaiser. An artide of the Peace Treaty obliged the
Germans to stigmatize all their greatest men and potentates
as War Criminals. The mere inscribing of all these
names upon the list was suffident to bring the whole
business to futility.

The one practical measure was to hang the Kaiser,
who was the ‘ AU-Highest ’ and who was constitutionally
responsible for everything that his armies had done.
Much vitality still remained in the trial of the Kaiser.
Mr. Lloyd George persisted and persevered. He was not
only committed to this aim ; he was ardent for it. The
Americans disinterested themselves in the naatter ; the
French mildly scandalized, but at the same time amused.

THE LEAGUE OF NATIONS

159

gave a gay assent. The law officers elaborated their pro- The Kaiser,
cesses. However, the Kaiser was outside Allied jurisdiction.

He had been driven out of France ; he had fled from Ger-
many; he had found refuge in Holland. A demand for
the extradition or surrender of the Kaiser was formally
made to Holland. Mr. Lloyd George at the height of his
triumph after the signature of the Treaty of Versailles
announced to Parliament that the Kaiser was to be tried
by an international tribtmal in London. What followed
might have been foreseen. Field-Marshal von Hindenburg
declared that he took full personal responsibility for aU
the acts done by the German armies from 1916 onwards
and offered to deliver himself to judgment. All the Kaiser’s
sons wrote by the hand of Prince Eitel Fritz, ofiering
themselves collectively as rams taken in the thicket. The
fugitive at Doom saw before him a martyr’s crown without
much likelihood of the usual physical inconveniences.

There can hardly have been a moment in history when
mart3nrdom stood at so high a premium.

But the Dutch are an obstinate people and, more import-
ant still, Holland is a small country. Small countries
were very much in fashion at the time of the Peace Confer-
ence. ‘ Gallant Little Belgium ’ was being evacuated, repar-
ated, compensated and congratulated. The war had been
fought to make sure that the smallest state should have
the power to assert its lawful rights against even the
greatest, and this will probably be for several generations
an endiuing fact. Holland came to the rescue of the
Allies — ^she refused to surrender the Kaiser. Whether or
not the subterranean intrigues of old world secret diplomacy
may have conveyed to the Dutch Government some assur-
ance that they would not be immediately fallen upon with
armed violence by all the victorious nations, will never be
ascertained. Mr. Lloyd George was genuinely indignant,
but by this time among responsible people in England he
was alone. The victorious States therefore submitted to
the Dutch refusal, and the Kaiser still dwells in Holland.

■K * >)• * >i>

We have now disposed of a number of much-talked-of
issues which beset the Peace Conference. None of them.

i6o THE WORLD CRISIS : the aftermath

Growing

Impatience.

excepting the League of Nations and the disposal of Ger-
man colonies, touched essentials, and the rest dispersed
themselves in a comparatively short time. Many people wiU
be quite surprised to remember how strongly they once felt
about them. The idealism of America has now defin-
itely made its contact with the wickedness of Britain and
of Europe. Absurd ideas about what the Germans should
pay are being embodied in clauses which will never be
put into execution and which indeed are safeguarded by
other clauses from ever being put into execution. The
War Criminals have found shelter imder the shields of the
most renowned warriors of Germany, and the Dutch will
not give up the Kaiser for Lloyd George to hang. Having
thus cleared the ground of many encumbrances and trivial-
ities, we are free to approach the central problems of race
and territory, of the balance of power in Europe and of
the foundations of a world state. These dominate the
future, and there is no cottage or hut in which a white,
brown, red, black or yellow family is now dwelling which
may not some day find itself directly and quite unpleasantly
affected by them.

Meanwhile, temper was rising in all the countries. The
British public demanded to know when peace was going to
be signed and how soon Germany would be made to pay
and what had happened about the Kaiser. The Republican
Party in America spoke in scornful terms of the President's
scheme for world improvement, and stridently called for
the return of the American troops and the collection of the
American debts. The Italians clamoured for a settlement
of their territorial and colonial requirements ; and France
was boiling with rage and anxiety about her future security.
Behind all, the defeated nations waited paralysed with
anxiety and incertitude to learn their fate.

It had been hoped that the acceptance by the British
Dominions of the mandatory principle, and the agreement
readied with President Wilson on this issue, would dear
the way for practical decisions about frontiers and juris-
dictions. But he remained determined that the drawing-up
and adoption of the Covenant of the League of Nations should
precede all territorial settlements. The Coimcil of Ten was

THE LEAGUE OF NATIONS

i6i

spurred to action by the fears and growing impatience of The
the coimtries they represented ; and in the earliest days of
February there occurred the first crisis of the Peace Con-
ference, Mr. Lloyd George, voicing the opinion of all,
demanded that practical issues should no longer be shelved.
How was it possible to frame this new world instrument
while everyone was waiting for the answers to urgent
questions ? An immense task lay before them. It was
their duty to make peace. They had gathered together
for that. They would fail in their duty if they did not
give it speedily to the world. It was known that the
President had to return to the United States on February 14
in order to discharge certain imperative constitutional
duties. How was it possible to decide the Covenant of
the League before then ? The President however declared
to an audience at once incredulous and reheved that all
should be settled by that date. This was in fact accom-
plished. The Commission was driven forward at break-
neck speed ; and by an extraordinary effort, in which the
British Delegation staff played a decisive part, the draft
Covenant of the League was actually finished and presented
in full Conference on February 14. Three months had now
passed since the firing stopped, and so far no agreement
had been reached on any one of the definite and aU-im-
portant issues upon which the immediate peace and recovery
of Europe depended. In many regions the power of the
victors to enforce their decisions had obviously diminished.

A heavy price in blood and privations was hi the end to
be paid by helpless and distracted peoples for the long
delay. But here at last was a majestic constitution to
which all the Allied States had given provisional but
earnest assent.

Many minds had made their contribution to the Coven-
ant of the League. Phillimore, Robert Cecil, Smuts and
Hurst are names which for ever link the British Empire
with its institution. Some errors and imperfections arose
inevitably from the haste and pressure under which the
Covenant was prepared. Nevertheless the base of the
new building was set upon the hving rock ; and the
mighty foundation stone, shaped by the innumerable

L

i 62 the world CRISIS: the aftermath

The

Foundation

Stone.

cMsellings of merciful men the world over and swung into
position by loyal and dexterous English pulleys, will bear
for all time the legend : ' Well and truly laid by Woodrow
Wilson, President of the United States of America.’ Who
can doubt that upon and around this granite block will
ultimately be built a dwelling-place and palace to which
‘ all the men in aU the lands ’ will sooner or later resort
in sure trust ?

CHAPTER IX

THE UNFINISHED TASK

‘ Bolshevism threatened to impose by force of arms its domina-
tion on those populations that had revolted against it, and
that were organized at our request. If we, as soon as they had
served our purpose and as soon as they had taken all the risks,
had said, ” Thank you, we are exceedingly obliged to you, you
have served our purpose. We need you no longer. Now let
the Bolsheviks cut your throats** we should have been mean — we
should havebeen thoroughly unworthy. . . .’ [Lloyd George,
Speech House of Commons, April i6, 1919.]

‘ If Russia is to be saved, as I pray she may be saved, she
must be saved by Russians. It must he by Russian manhood
and Russian courage and Russian virtue that the rescue and
regeneration of this once mighty nation and famous branch of
the European family can alone be achieved. The aid which we
can give to these Russian Armies — who we do not for gel were
called into the fidd originally during the German war to some
extent by our inspiration and who are now engaged in fighting
against the foul baboonery of Bolshevism — can be given by
arms, munitions, equipment, and technical services raised upon
a voluntary basis. But Russia must be saved by Russian
exertions, and it must be from the heart of the Russian people
and with their strong arm that the conflict against Bolshevism
in Russia must be mainly waged.’ [Churchill, Speech
Mansion House, Feb. 19, 1919.]

Commitments at tlie Armistice — ^Lord Balfour’s Memorandum of
November 29 — ^Britisli and French Spheres of Interference —
The French at Odessa — ^At the War Office — ^Prinkipo — ^The
Conference in Paris — My Proposals — Correspondence with the
Prime Minister — ^The Bullitt Mission — ^The Situation Worsens —
Noltchak — ^Advance of the Siberian Army — ^The Big Five
question Koltchak — ^Note to Koltchak — ^His Reply — Decision
of the Great Powers to Support Him — Too Late.

P RESIDENT WILSON'S departure and tlie interlude
wMch. followed at Paris afford tlie opportunity for
placing the reader once more in contact with the gaunt
realities which prowled outside.

164 THE WORLD CRISIS : the aftermath

Commit- The Armistice and the coUapse of Germany had altered aU

Amisti«. * Russian values and relations. The Allies had only entered
Russia with reluctance and as an operation of war. But
the war was over. They had made exertions to deny to the
German armies the vast supplies of Russia : but these armies
existed no more. They had set out to rescue the Czechs ; but
the Czechs had already saved themselves. Therefore every
argument which had led to intervention had disappeared.

On the other hand, all the Allies were involved physically
and morally in many parts of Russia. The British com-
mitments were in some ways the most serious. Twelve
thousand British and eleven thousand AUied troops
were actually ice-bound in North Russia at Murmansk
and Archangel. Whatever was decided, they must stay
there imtil the spring. Naturally the position of such
detachments against whom the Bolsheviks might concen-
trate very large forces was not free from anxiety. Colonel
John Ward, M.P., and the two British battalions, together
with some sailors from the cruiser Suffolk, were in the heart
of Siberia playing a remarkable part by arms and counsel in
sustaining the Omsk Government. The new Siberian army
was being rapidly created. It had received from British
sources alone 100,000 rifles and 200 guns. It was lar gely
dressed in British uniforms. Training schools under British
management had been established at Vladivostok, and were
in process of turning out 3,000 Russian officers of indifferent
quality. In the South Denikin, who had succeeded to
the command when Alexeiev died, had been encouraged
to expect the help of the Allies at the earliest possible
moment. With the opening of the Dardanelles and-
the entry of the British Fleet into the Black Sea, it had
become possible to send a British military commission to
Novorossisk. On the reports of this commission the War
Cabinet decided on November 14, 1918, to assist Denikin
with arms and munitions ; to send additional officers and
military equipment to Siberia and to grant de facto recogni-
tion to the Omsk Government.

Lord Balfour, the Foreign Secretary, in a Memorandum
of November 29 set forth to the Cabinet the policy which
should be pursued.

THE UNFINISHED TASK

165

‘ This cottntry/ he wrote, * would certainly refuse to see Lord
its forces, after more than four years of strenuous fighting,
dissipated over the huge expanse of Russia in order to carry dmn
out political reforms in a State which is no longer a beUiger- November
ent AUy.

‘ We have constantly asserted that it is for the Russians
to choose their own form of government, that we have no
desire to intervene in their domestic affairs, and that if,
in the course of operations essentially directed against the
Central Powers we have to act with such Russian political
and military organizations as are favourable to the Entente,
this does not imply that we deem ourselves to have any
mission to estabhsh or disestablish any particular political
system among the Russian people.

‘ To these views His Majesty's Government stiU adhere,
and their military policy in Russia is still governed by them.

But it does not follow that we can disinterest ourselves
whoUy from Russian affairs. Recent events have created
obligations which last beyond the occasions which gave them
birth. The Czechoslovaks are our Allies and we must do
what we can to help them. In the South-east comer of Russia,
in Europe, in Siberia, in Transcaucasia and Transcaspia,
in the territories adjacent to the White Sea and the Arctic
Ocean, new anti-Bolshevik administrations have grown
up under the shelter of Allied forces. We are responsible
for their existence and must endeavour to support them.

How far we can do this, and how such a poHcy will ultimately
develop, we cannot yet say. It must largely depend upon
the course taken by the associated Powers vdio have far
larger resources at their disposal than ourselves. For us no
alternative is open at present than to use such troops as we
possess to the best advantage ; where we have no troops
to supply arms and money ; and in the case of the Baltic
provinces, to protect as far as we can the nascent nation-
alities by the help of our Fleet. Such a policy must neces-
sarily seem halting and imperfect to those who on the spot
are resisting the invasion of milit2mt Bolshevism, but it
is all that we can accomplish or ought in existing circum-
stances to attempt,’

On November 30 our representatives at Archangel and
Vladivostok were informed that the general lines of policy
towards Russia which the Government proposed to follow
were :

‘ To remain in occupation at Murmansk and Archangel
for the time being ; to continue the Siberian Expedition ;

British and
French
Spheres of
Interfer-
ence.

i66 THE WORLD CRISIS ; the aftermath

to try to persuade tie C2echs to remain in Western Siberia ;
to occupy [with five British brigades] the Baku-Batum
railway; to give General Denikin at Novorossisk all
possible’help in the way of military material ; to supply
the Baltic States with military material.’

This was a far-reaching programme. It not only com-
prised existing commitments, but added to them large new
enterprises in the Caucasus and in South Russia. Of these
some accotmt must be given.

A year before, on December 23, 1917, an Anglo-
French Convention had been agreed at Paris between
Clemenceau, Pichon and Foch on the one hand, and
Lord Milner, Lord Robert Cecil, and British military
representatives on the other, regulating the future action
of France and Britain in southern Russia. This Con-
vention contemplated the support of General Alexeiev,
then at Novo Tcherkask, and divided geographically the
spheres of action of the two Powers so far as they might
be able to act at all. French action would develop to the
north of the Black Sea ‘ against the enemy,' i.e. Germany,
and hostile Russians ; that of England to the east of the
Black Sea against the Turks. It followed^om this, as set
out in Article 3, that the French zone would consist of
Bessarabia, the Ukreiine, and the Crimea ; and the English
zone, of the Cossack territories, the Caucasus, Armenia,
Georgia, and Kurdistan. The War Cabinet on November 13,
1918, reaffirmed their adherence to these limitations.'

In consequence the British landed at Batum and rapidly
occupied the Caucasian railway from the Black Sea to the
Caspian at Baku. Here our troops found a friendly and on
the whole a wdcoming, though agitated population. They
settled down along the 400-miles’ stretch of railway and
acted as ‘ big brothers ’ to the inhabitants and their various
fluctuating governments, and devdoped a flotilla which soon
secured the effective command of the Caspian Sea. This
sea is larger .than the British Isles. The British forces, about
20,000 strong, were by the end of January, 1919, in possession
of one of the greatest strategic lines in the world, and
both flanks rested securdy on superior naval power on
the two inland seas. What the British Government was

THE UNFINISHED TASK 167

going to do with it was never dearly thought out. Behind
this shield the peoples of Georgia, of Armenia, and of
Azerbaijan were to be free to develop their independent
existence ; and incursions by the Bolsheviks, whether into
Trurkey (at that time entirdy submissive), or Kurdistan, or
Persia, were prevented. There was never any fighting and
no lives were lost 5 but it was with the greatest difficulty,
on account of our diminishing forces, that this protecting
line was maintained intact for about a year.

Disastrous fortxmes attended the French incursion into
their assigned sphere. A condition of the Armistice had
prescribed the immediate evacuation by the Germans of
the Ukraine. This seemed reasonable enough to those
whose minds were inflamed by the conflict with the Central
Powers, and the Germans themsdves had no wish but to
comply and go home. In fact, however, it withdrew from
South Russia the only strong, sane, effective element by
which the daily life of twenty or thirty million people
was maintained. As the once-hated and dreaded ' steel-
hdmets ’ swiftly evacuated the towns and cities of South
Russia, the Red Guards followed apace, emd rousing the
dregs of the population against the bourgeoisie and against
all who had been friendly either to the German invader
or to the cause of the Allies, celebrated their assumption
of power by horrible massacres and prolonged, insatiate
proscriptions.

While these lamentable events were in progress, the
Frendi on December 20 landed with about two divisions,
supported by a powerful fleet, at Odessa. Their strength
was swelled by two Greek divisions fumi^ed by Venizdos,
at the request of the Supreme Coundl of the Allies. There-
upon occurred the first real collision between the Auctors emd
the Bolsheviks. It was not dedded by the ordinary imple-
ments of war. The foreign occupation offended the inhabi-
tants : the Bolsheviks profited by their discontents. Their
propaganda, incongruously patriotic and Communist, spread
far and vride through the Ukraine. On February 6, 1919,
they reoccupied Kiev, and the population of the surrounding
districts rose against the foreigners and the capitalists. The
French troops were themsdves affected by the Communist

The French
at Odessa.

'i68 THE WORLD CRISIS: the aftermath

The French propaganda, and practically the whole of the fleet mutinied,
at Odessa. should they fight now that the war was over ? Why

should they interfere in Russian affairs ? Why should they
not go home ? Why should they not indeed assist those
Russian movements which sought to level aU national
authority and establish the universal regime of soldiers,
sailors, and workmen ? The welL-tempered weapon which
had served with scarcely a failure in all the clashes of Arma-
geddon nowhroke surprisingly in the hands which turned it to
a new task. The mutiny in the French fleet was suppressed,
and its ringleaders were long in prison ; but a shock was
sustained in Paris which promptly terminated the whole
adventure. On April 6 the French evacuated Odessa, and
the Greek divisions, which had been unmoved by these
occurrences, were simultaneously withdrawn to their own
country. Hard on their heels the Bolsheviks entered the
city and inaugurated a second fierce revenge.

This brief recital of the salient episodes is necessarily
incomplete. The same kind of ebullitions and confusions
were repeated with var3nng features wherever Bolshevik
and anti-Bolshevik forces were in the field. A welter of
murder and anarchy, of pillage and repression, of counter-
revolt and reprisal, of treachery and butchery, of feeble
- meddling and bloody deeds, extended in a broad belt from the
White Sea to the Black. In all this zone no one knew
what to do or whom to foUow. No organization seemed
proof against the universal decomposition, and cruelty and
fear reigned in chaos over a hundred million people.

Marshal Foch had on January 12 brought the Russian-
PoHsh situation before the Supreme War Council. He
proposed to add to the Armistice terms, then requiring to
be renewed, a condition that the Dantzig-Thorn railroad
should be put in good order by the Germans, and should,
together with the port of Dantzig, be available for the move-
ment of Allied troops. He contemplated forming a consider-
able army principally of American troops, together wdth
Polish forces and well-disposed Russian prisoners of war,
for the protection of Poland and operations against the
Bolsheviks. The Americans had however no intention
of being used for such a purpose however desirable. It

THE UNFINISHED TASK

169

was certain that no British troops would he available. At the War
The Marshal therefore fell hack on minor expedients, and
the statesmen took refuge in platitude.

4c sis 4e 4c 4c

I entered the War Of&ce as Secretary of State on January
14, 1919, and became an heir to the pledges and tragedies
of this situation as well as to those domestic difficulties
recounted in a previous chapter. Up to this moment I had
taken no part of any kind in Russian affairs, nor had I been
responsible for any commitment. I foimd myself in the
closest agreement on almost every point with Sir Henry
Wilson, the Chief of the Imperial General Staff, and the
policy which we advised and, so far as we had the power,
pursued to the end, had at any rate the merit of simplicity.

Our armies were melting fast. The British people would not
supply the men or the money for any large military establish-
ment elsewhere than on the Rhine. It was highly question-
able whether any troops raised under compulsion for the
war against Germany would consent to fight anybody else
in any circumstances, or even to remain long in occupation
of conquered territory. We therefore sang one tune in
harmony : contract your commitments ; select your obli-
gations ; and make a success of those to which you are
able to adhere.

We then urged the following measures : first, to wind up
the Batum-Baku adventure in the Caucasus and bring our
substantial forces out of danger and responsibility without
delay ; secondly, to make a peace with Tmkey that would
show her’that England was her friend : thirdly, to dischargee
our pledges faithfully and fully by arming and equipping the
anti-Bolshevik forces from our own immense surplus of
munitions, and help them with expert officers and instruc-
tors to train efficient armies of their own. Naturally
it followed that we diould try to combine all the border
States hostile to the Bolsheviks into one system of war
and diplomacy and get everyone else to do as much as
possible. Such was the policy we consistently pursued —
and such were its limitations.

But an alternative policy of which there were powerful
advocates competed and clashed with these simple con-

170 THE WORLD CRISIS ; the aftermath

Prinkipo. ceptions. The British Government had enquired as early
as December, 1918, of its allies and associates whether
some sort of peace proposals could not profitably be made
to Russia.^ Although this scheme was frowned upon by
the French, and its rumour caused an outcry in '^England,
Mr. Lloyd George,® raised the question again on January
16, 1919, and suggested that representatives of Moscow
and of the various generals and states with which Moscow
was at war should be summoned to Paris ‘in the way
that the Roman Empire sunomoned generals of out-lying
tributary states to render an account of their actions.'

President Wilson adopted Mr. Lloyd George's suggestion,
and on January 3i, 1919, it was decided that the United
States should draft the invitations. But the rendezvous
was changed. Instead of Paris, the island of Prinkipo in
the Sea of Marmora was chosen. Very near to Prinkipo
lay another island to which the Young Turks before the
war had exiled all the pariah dogs which had formerly
infested the streets of Constantinople. These dogs, shipped
there in tens of thousands, were left to devour one another
and ultimately to starve. I saw them with my own eyes,
gathered in troops upon the rocky shores, when I visited
Turkey in 1909 in a friend's yacht. The bones of these
dogs still whitened the inhospitable island, and their
memory noisomely pervaded the neighbourhood. To Bol-
shevik sympathizers the place seemed oddly chosen for a
Peace Conference. To their opponents it seemed not
altogether unsuitable.

The invitation was accepted by the Bolsheviks in ambig-
uous terms on February 4. The white Governments of
Siberia and Archangel, as well as Nabokov, Sazonov and
'Other representatives of the anti-Bolshevik groups, refused it
with contempt. The whole idea of entering into negotiations
with the Bolsheviks was abhorrent to the do min ant elements
of public opinion, both in Great Britain and in France.

It was at this stage that I was for the first time involved
in the Paris discussions about Russia. Having directly
on my hands the Archangel, Koltchak and Denikin military

* The Foreign Relations of Soviet Rtissia, by A. L. P. Dennis.

^Ibid., p. 76.

THE UNFINISHED TASK 171

commitments, I had repeatedly pressed the Prime Minister
for a definite policy. In long anxious conversations he
showed his customary patience and kindness in dealing
with the anxieties of a colleague. He finally suggested that
I should go to Paris and see what could be done within the
scope of our limited action.

Accordingly on February 14 , 1 crossed the Channel on this
mission, and sat in the seats of the Mighty. Then I saw
the scene which has been so often described of the Peace
Conference at work : Clemenceau presiding, grim, rugged,
snow-white, with black skull-cap ; opposite him Marshal
Foch, very formal, very subdued, grave, illustrious, lovable.
On either hand, in sumptuous chairs, sat the representa-
tives of the victorious Powers. Arotmd Gobehn tapestries,
mirrors, gilding and glittering lights 1 This was the only
occasion when I had any official contact with President
Wilson, and I shall recount what occurred.

The Conference had sat long that day, and it was past
seven o’clock when the Russian item on the agenda was
reached. It was the very night that President Wilson
was leaving on his first return journey to the United States.
He had only a short time to get his dinner and catch his
train to Cherbourg. He had actually risen from his place
to leave the Conference, and there could not have been
a less propitious moment for raising an extra, disagreeable
and bafifimg topic. However, with the persistence bom of
my direct responsibilities upon the various Russian fronts,
and with all sorts of crael realities, then proceeding,
present in my mind, I stood up and made my appeal.

' Could we not have some decision about Russia ? Fight-
ing was ^actually going on. Men were being killed and
wounded. What was the policy? Was it peace or was
it war ? Were we to stop or were we to go on ? Was the
President going away to America leaving this question quite
unanswered? What was to happen while he was away ?
Was nothing to go on except aimless unorganized bloodshed
till he came back ? Surely there should be an answer given. '

The President, contrary to my expectation, was affable.
He tmned back to the table and, resting his elbow
on Clemenceau’s chair, listened without sitting down

The Confer-
ence in Paris.

V]Z THE WORLD CRISIS : the aftermath

My to wLat I had to say. Then he replied frankly and

Proposals, gjmpjy to the following effect : ‘ Russia was a problem to

which he did not pretend to know the solution. There
were the gravest objections to every course, and yet some
course must be taken — ^sooner or later. He was anxious
to dear out of Russia altogether, but was willing, if neces-
sary, to meet the Bolsheviks alone (i.e. without the National
Russians) at Prinkipo. Nevertheless, if Prinkipo came to
nothing, he would do his share with the other Allies in any
military measures which they considered necessary and
practicable to help the Russian armies now in the field.’
Then he left us.

It seemed to me obvious that whatever the Russian
policy of the Allies might be or by whatever measures it
might be executed, some central body should be set up to
study and concert it. To the fifty-eight commissions
there might at least be added a fifty-ninth for Russia.

Next day, at a special meeting at the Quai d’Orsay on
the Russian situation, I proposed, with Mr, Balfour's
approval, the setting up of an Allied Council for Russian
Affairs with political, economic and military sections, and
with executive power wdthin the limits of the policy
defined for it by the Allied Governments ; and that the
military inquiry into what resources were available and how
they could best be co-ordinated should proceed forthwith.

I reported the course of the discussion to the Prime
Minister and added:

' If Prinkipo fell through, the Supreme War Council
could be presented immediately with a complete mili-
tary plan and an expression of opinion from the highest
military authorities as to whether within the limits of our
available resources there is a reasonable prospect of success.
The Supreme War Council would then be in a position to
take a definite decision whether to dear out altogether or
to adopt the plan.’

The following were the actual proposals :

Draft Wireless Message.

• • Feib. 15, 1919.

The Princes Island proposal of the Allied Powers has
now been made public for more than a month. The Bol-

THE UNFINISHED TASK

m

sheviks have replied by wireless on the 6th instant offering My
to meet the wishes of the Allied Powers as regards the
repayment of loans, the grant of concessions for mineral
and forest rights, and to examine the rights of eventual
annexation of Russian territories by the Entente Powers.

The Allies repudiate the suggestion that such objects
have influenced their intervention in Russia. The supreme
desire of the Allies is to see peace restored in Russia and
the establishment of a Government based upon the will
of the broad mass of the Russian people.

It is solely with this object that the Princes Island pro-
posal has been made. It is not essential to that proposal
that any conference should be held or that representatives
of the various Russian forces in the field should meet
around a common table. But what is imperative is that
fighting should stop, and stop forthwith. The Bolshevik
Government while verbally accepting the invitation to
Princes Island have, so far from observing a truce of arms,
taken the offensive in many directions and are at the present
time attacking on several fronts. In addition they have
called up new classes and expedited and expanded their
military preparations.

It is therefore necessary to fix a precise time within
which the Princes Island proposal must be disposed of.
Unless within lo days from the 15th instant the Bolshevik
forces on all fronts have ceased to attack and have with-
drawn a distance of not less than 5 miles from the present
position of their adversaries’ outpost lines, the Princes Island
proposal will be deemed to have lapsed. If, however,
within 5 days a wireless notification is received from the
Bolshevik Government that they have so ceased attacking,
so ceased firing and so withdrawn, and if this is confirmed
by the reports received from the various fronts, a s imilar
request will be addressed by the Allies to the forces con-
fronting them.

It is in these circumstances only that a discussion at
Princes Island can take place.

Proposal for a Committee of the Associated Powers

TO EXAMINE THE POSSIBILITIES OF ALLIED MILITARY
Intervention in Russia.

In anticipation of the SoAuet Government refusing to
accept the allied terms and continuing hostilities, it is
suggested that suitable machinery should be set up forth-
with to consider the practical possibilities of joint military
action by the Associated Powers acting in conjunction witih.

Correspond-
ence with
the Prime
Minister.

174 THE WORLD CRISIS: the aftermath

the independent border States and pro-AUy Governments in
Russia.

The machinery in question might take the form of a
Commission comprising military representatives of the
American, British, French, Italian and Japanese Govern-
ments. This Commission would make it its business, among
other things, to examine competent representatives of
Russia, Finland, Esthonia, Poland and the other border
States, in order to form an estimate of the actual military
assistance which these States and Govermnents are in a
position to supply, and to prepare a plan for the utilization
of the joint resources.

It is considered that the existing organization at Versailles,
with certain necessary additions, would be suitable for
the purpose, but in this case it should be understood
that the military representatives would be acting as the
mouthpieces of the Chiefs of the Staff of their respective
nationalities.

The Committee should endeavour to furnish their report
within 10 days, or whatever time limit is set in the ulti-
matum that it is now proposed to send to the belligerent
Governments in Russia.

Mr. Lloyd George’s view is well set forth in the following
telegram :

Prime Minister to Mr. Philip Kerr.

February 16, 1919.

See Churchill and tell him I like the cable which it is
proposed to send Bolsheviks. As to alternative programme.
I trust he will not commit us to any costly operations which
would involve any large contribution either of men or
money. The form of his cable to me looks rather too much
like tliis. I had understood from his conversation with me
that all he had in mind was to send expert details who
volunteer to go to Russia together with any equipment we
can spare. I also rmderstand om: volunteer army has not
to be drawn upon for that purpose and that effort made to
secure volunteers would not be on such a scale as to arouse
vehement opposition in this country involving us in heavy
expenditure and interfere with growth of our own volunteer
army.

AU these things ought to be made dear to all the other
Powers before an agreement is arrived at otherwise they
might either depend too much on us or subsequently up-
braid us with having failed in our promises. The main idea

THE UNFINISHED TASK 175

ought to be to enable Russia to save herself if she desires
to do so; and if she does not taike advantage of opportunity,
then it means either that she does not wish to be saved
from Bolshevism or that she is past saving. There is only
one justification for interfering in Russia — ^that Russia
wants it. If she does, then Koltchak, Krasnov and Deni-
kin ought to be able to raise much larger force than
Bolsheviks. This force we could equip, and a well-equipped
force of willing men would soon overthrow Bolshevik army
of unwilling conscripts especially if whole population is
against them.

If, on the other hand, Russia is not behind Krasnov and
his coadjutors, it is an outrage on every British principle
of freedom that we should use foreign armies to force upon
Russia a Government which is repugnant to its people.

I replied that in accordance with his views the limited
character of our assistance would be clearly stated. It
was not however possible to obtain any measure of
agreement between the Powers. Perhaps if President
Wilson and Mr. Lloyd George had both been present, some
conclusion either in one sense or the other might have been
reached.

Mr. Churchill to the Prime Minister.

This afternoon I proposed the formation of a mili tary
commission to enquire into what measixres were possible
to sustain the Russian armies we had called into being
during the war with Germany and to protect the independ-
ence of the border States.

Fears were expressed that even setting up a commission
to enquire into the military situation might leak out and
cause alarm.

Mr. Balfour therefore proposed that no formal commission
should be set up, but that the military authorities might
be allowed informally to talk together and, instead of
presenting a report to the Conference as a whole, might
individually hand to their respective representatives on the^
Conference a copy of the results of their informal and
unofficial conversations.

After Clemenceau had commented on the strange spectacle
of the victorious nations in this great struggle being afraid
even to remit to the study of their military advisers at
Versailles a matter admittedly of vital importance to Europe,
this project was agreed to.

Correspond-
ence with
the Prime
Minister.

The Bullitt
Mission.

176 THE WORLD CRISIS : the aftermath

You are therefore committed at some date in the near
future to receiving an informal document embod37ing
certain military opinions bearing upon Russia. You are
committed to nothing else. . . .

In the circumstances it was useless for me to remain in
Paris, and I therefore returned to London on the i8th. I
am sure the procedure I proposed was reasonable and prac-
tical. The one chance of success and safety for the National
Russians lay in the united countenance of the Allies, and the
proper concerting of any action they could take. The Allies
had not much to give them, but they might at least have
given it in a manner likely to be useful.

4c ii: 9k

Both the Prinkipo proposals and the study of the military
and diplomatic possibilities having been reduced to nullity,
the Americans with the assent of Mr. Lloyd George sent a
certain Mr. Bullitt to Russia on February 22. He returned
to Paris in a week or two with proposals for an accom-
modation from the Soviet Government in his pocket. The
moment was unpropitious. Koltchak’s armies had just
gained notable successes in Siberia, and Bela Krm had
raised his Communist rebellion in Hungary. French and
British indignation against truckling to the Bolshe'wks
was at its height. The Soviet proposals to Mr. Bullitt,
which were of course in themselves fraudulent, were treated
with general disdain ; and Bullitt himself was not without
some difficulty disowned by those who had sent him.

Thus again we reached the void.

The Prime Minister, nettled by repeated War Office
requests for decisions of policy, retorted by demanding
exact estimates of the cost in money of the various alter-
natives open.

Mr. Churchill to the Prime Minister.

Feb. 27, 1919.

I send you herewith a statement of British assistance
given to Russia, which, as you will see, is considerable.
The criticism that may Ije passed is that it is related to no
concerted policy, and that while it constitutes a serious
drain on our resources it is not backed with sufficient vigour
to lead to any definite residt. There is no ‘ will to win '

THE UNFINISHED TASK 177

behind any of these ventures. At every point we fall The
short of what is necessary to obtain real success. The Situation
lack of any ‘ will to win ’ communicates itself to our troops
and affects their morale : it communicates itself to our
Russian allies and retards their organization, and to our
enemies and encourages their efforts.

With regard to your complaint that the War Office have
not furnished you with information, I must point out to
you that the War Cabinet have long been accustomed to
deal direct with the Chief of the Staff and other military
authorities, and they know as well as I do the difficulties of
obtaining precise plans and estimates of cost from military
men in regard to this Russian problem. The reason is that
aU the factors are uncertain and that the military con-
siderations are at every point intermingled with political
decisions which have not been given. For instance, to
begin with what is fundamental, the Allied Powers in
Paris have not decided whether they wish to make war
upon the Bolsheviks or to make peace with them. They
are pausing midway between these two courses with an
equal dislike of either. . . .

And a fortnight later

Mr. Churchill to the Prime Minister.

March 14, 1919.

The four months which have passed since the Armistice
was signed have been disastrous almost without relief
for the anti-Bolshevik forces. This is not due to any
great increase in Bolshevik strength, though there has
been a certain augmentation. It is due to the lack of
any policy on the part of the Allies, or of any genuine
or effective support put into the operations which are going
on against the Bolsheviks at different points in Russia.

Prmkipo has played its part in the general discourage-
ment and relaxation which has set in. The fact that the
German troops were commanded to withdraw from the
Ukraine without any provision being made to stop the
Bolshevik advance, has enabled large portions of this rich
territory full of new supplies of food to be overrun, and the
BoMieviks are now very near the Black Sea at Kherson.

There are many signs of weakness in Koltchak's forces, and,
as you have observed, many Bolshevik manifestations are
talong place behind the Siberian front, in one of which the
Japanese have had quite severe fighting.

^

M

178 THE WORLD CRISIS: the aftermath

Koltchak. It -will be convenient at this stage somewhat to anticipate
the fortunes of Admiral Koltchak and the march of events
in Siberia.

Koltchak, a vigorous man in the early forties, was in
many ways the naval counterpart of Kornilov. On the
outbreak of the revolution, after a mutiny of bis fleet
in which he had proved his personal courage and
physical strength, he had been advised by the Pro-
visional Government to take refuge in Japan, for they
would probably have need of him at a later stage. On
their fall he had entered Siberia from the East and had
for some months been serving in the curious r 61 e of Minister
of Marine in the Omsk Government, which was at no
point less than 1,000 miles from the sea. Koltchak was
honest, loyal and incorruptible. His outlook and tempera-
ment were autocratic ; but he tried hard to be liberal
and progressive in accordance with what he was assured
was the spirit of the times. He had no political experience,
and was devoid of those profound intuitions which have
enabled men of equal virtue and character to steer their
way through the shoals and storms of revolution. He
was an intelligent, honourable, patriotic admiral. He
took no part in the movement or conspiracy which over-
threw the civil power ; but when the necessities of the
time and the general demand of those with whom he was
in contact thrust upon him the responsibilities of dicta-
torship, he accepted the duty. He proclaimed himself
‘ Supreme Ruler ’ and Commander-in-Chief for Siberia,
the Cossack territories, and Orenburg. He stated that
his chief aims were "the revival of the fighting power
of the army, the triumph over Bolshevism, and the
restoration of law and order so that the Russian people
may without hindrance select its own form of govern-
ment." There is no doubt that this programme met the
needs of the moment. In practice, any vigorous policy
involved the total exclusion of the anti-Bolshevik Socialists
from the Siberian government. These auxiliaries, ham-
pering in council, feeble to help but powerful to em-
barrass, became henceforward definite opponents. On
the other hand, the principal trading and industrial

THE UNFINISHED TASK

179

circles, the co-operative societies, the rntmidpal institutions. Advance of
and above aU the indispensable military power, rallied at Amy.
once and increasingly in Koltchak’s support. The mass
remained simk in Russian apathy and fatalism. He was
the best man available ; his programme was the right
programme ; but he possessed neither the authority of the
Imperial autocracy nor of the Revolution. He was
destined to fail in investing with fighting strength those
intermediate conceptions which are the commonplaces
of civilized society.

Under his direction General Gaida, now commanding the
Siberian army, numbering about 100,000 men, for the time
being advanced rapidly, reforming the whole front from
which the Czechs had been withdrawn. By the end of
January they had reconquered a belt of territory 150 miles
wide. On March i, encouraged by these successes, they
resumed the offensive, with the object of gaining in the
centre and south the line of the Volga, and in the north
of joining hands through Viatka and Kotlas with the
Russian and inter-aUied forces at Archangel. An advance
on a front of 700 miles with only 100,000 men could not
succeed if any serious resistance was encountered. Never-
theless, by the ist of May the Siberians had further
advanced on their enormous front to a depth of 125 miles
in the north and 250 miles in the centre. In the south
also they had achieved appreciable successes. Meanwhile,
in the Black Sea region, the Russian voltmteer army
under Denikin, now joined to Krasnov’s 100,000 Cossacks,
had become a considerable military factor, less imposing
but more solid than the Siberian forces. In this theatre
there was much more real fighting, and actual trials of
strength took place from time to time between the com-
batants

Such was the position on which the Supreme Coimcil
of the Allies in the end of May, 1919, came at last to take its
decision.

Clemenceau, Lloyd George, President Wilson, Orlando,
and the Japanese delegate, Saionji, set forth their views
on May 26 in a note addressed to Admiral Koltchak. This
document is so important that it must be printed textually.

i8o THE WORLD CRISIS: the aftermath

The

' Big Five *

question

Koltchak.

Note from the Supreme Council to Admiral Koltchak,
May 26th, 1919.

The Allied and Associated Powers feel that the time has
come when it is necessary for them once more to make
clear the policy they propose to pursue in regard to Russia.

It has always been a cardinal axiom of the Allied and
Associated Powers to avoid interference in the internal
affair s of Russia. Their original intervention was made
for the sole purpose of assisting those elements in Russia
which wanted to continue the struggle against German
autocracy and to free their country from German rule,
and in order to rescue the Czechoslovaks from the danger
of annihilation at the hands of the Bolshevist forces.

Since the signature of the Armistice on November nth,
1918, they have kept forces in various parts of Russia.
Munitions and supplies have been sent those associated with
them at a very considerable cost. No sooner however did
the peace conference assemble than they endeavoured to
bring peace and order to Russia by inviting representatives
of all the warring governments within Russia to meet them
in the hope that they might be able to arrange a permanent
solution of the Russian problem.

This proposal and the later offer to relieve the suffering
milli ons of Russia, broke down through the refusal of
the Soviet government to accept the fundamental con-
dition of suspending hostilities while negotiations for the
work of relief were proceeding.

Some of the Allied and Associated Governments are
now being pressed to withdraw their troops and to incur
no further expense in Russia on the ground that continued
intervention shows no prospect of producing an early
settlement. They are prepared, however, to continue their
assistance on the lines laid down below, provided they are
satisfied that it will really help the Russian people to
liberty, self-government, and peace.

The AUied and Associated Governments now wish to
declare formally that the object of their policy is to restore
peace within Russia by enabling the Russian people to
resume control of their own affairs through the instrument-
ality of a freely elected constituent assembly, and to restore
peace along its frontiers by arranging for the settlement of
disputes in regard to the boundaries of the Russian State
and its relations with its neighbours through the peaceful
arbitration of the League of Nations,

They are convinced by their experience of the last twelve
months that it is not possible to attain these ends by dealing

THE UNFINISHED TASK i8i

with the Soviet Government of Moscow. They are there- Note to
fore disposed to assist the government of Admiral Koltchak Koitcbak.
and his associates with munitions, supplies, and food to
establish themselves as the government of all Russia, pro-
vided they receive from them definite guarantees that
their policy has the same object in view as the Allied and
Associated Powers.

With this object they would ask Admiral Koltchak and his
associates whether they would agree to the following as
the conditions under which they would accept continued
assistance from the Allied and Associated Powers.

In the first place as soon as they reach Moscow that they
will summon a constituent assembly elected by a free,
secret, and democratic franchise, as the supreme legislature
for Russia, to which the government of Russia must be
responsible, or, if at that time order is not sufiSciently
restored, they will summon the Constituent Assembly,
elected in 1917, to sit until such time as new elections are
possible.

Secondly — ^that throughout the areas whidi they at
present control they wiU permit free elections in the normal
course for all free and legally constituted assemblies, such
as municipalities. Zemstvos, etc.

Thirdly — ^that they will countenance no attempt to revive
the special privilege of any class or order in Russia. The
Allied and Associated Powers have noted with satisfaction
the solemn declaration made by Admiral Koltchak and his
associates, that they have no intention of restoring the
former land system. They feel that the principles to be
followed in the solution of this and other internal questions
must be left to free decision of the Russian Constituent
Assembly. But they wish to be assured that those whom
they are prepared to assist stand for the civil and religious
liberty of all Russian citizens and wiU. make no attempt to
re-introduce the regime which the revolution has destroyed.

Fourthly — ^that the independence of Finland and Poland
be recognized, and that in the event of the frontiers and
other relations between Russia and these countries not
being settled by agreement, they will be referred to the
arbitration of the League of Nations.

Fifthly — ^thatif a solution of the relations between Esthonia,

Latvia, Lithuania, and the Caucasian and Trans-Caspian
territories and Russia is not speedily reached by agreement,
the settlement wiU be made in consultation and co-operation
with the League of Nations, and that until such settlement
is made, the government of Russia agrees to recognize these
territories as autonomous and to confirm the relations which

i82 the world crisis? the aftermath

His Reply.

may exist between their de facto Governments and the
AUied and Associated Governments.

Sixthly — ^that the right of the Peace Conference to deter-
mine the future of the Roumanian part of Bessarabia be
recognized.

Seventhly — ^that as soon as a government for Russia baa
been constituted on a democratic basis, Russia should join
the League of Nations and co-operate with other members
in the limitation of armaments and military organization
throughout the world.

Finally — ^that they abide by the declaration made by
Admiral Koltchak on November 37th, 1918, in regard to
Russia’s national debt.

The Allied and Associated Powers will be glad to learn
as soon as possible whether the government of Admiral
Koltchak and his associates is prepared to accept these con-
ditions, and also whether in the event of acceptance they
will undertake to form a single government and army
command as soon as the military situation makes it possible.

G. Clemenceau.

Lloyd George.

Orlando.

Woodrow Wilson.

Saionji.

Naturally Koltchak did not delay his reply. ‘ I should
not retain power one day longer than required by the
interests of the country ; my first thought at the moment
when the Bolsheviks are definitely crushed will be to
fix the date of the election of the Constituent As-
sembly. ... I shall hand over to it all my power in order
that it may freely determine the system of government ;
I have, moreover, taken the oath to do this before the
Supreme Russian Tribtmal, the guardian of legality. All
my efforts are aimed at concluding the civil war as soon as
possible by crushing Bolshevism in order to put the Russian
people in a position to express its free will.' He then pro-
ceeded to answer satisfactorily all the specific questions
which the Coimcil of Five had asked.

This answer was dated June 4, and on June 12 Lloyd
George, Wilson, Clemenceau, and the representative of
Japan, welcomed the tone of the reply which seemed to
them ' to be in substantial agreement with the proposition
they had made, and to contain satisfactory assurances for

THE UNFINISHED TASK 183

the freedom and self-government of the Russian people
and their neighbours.’ They were therefore ‘willing to
extend to Admiral Koltchak and his Associates the support
set forth in their original letter.’

If this far-reaching and openly prodaimed decision was
wise now in June, would it not have been wiser in January ?
No argument existed in June not obvious in January i and
half the power available in January was gone by June.
Six months of degeneration and uncertainty had chilled
the Siberian Armies and wasted the slender authority of the
Omsk Government. It had given the Bolsheviks the
opportunity of raising armies, of consolidating their power
and of identifying themselves to some extent with Russia.
It had provided enough opposition to stimulate and not
enough to overcome the sources of their strength. The
moment chosen by the Supreme Council for their dedara-
tion was almost exactly the moment when that declaration
was certainly too late.

Decision of
the Great
Powers to
Support
Him,

CHAPTER X
THE TRIUMVIRATE

Wilson and
Preliminary
Terms-

‘ To you all three,

The senators of this great world.’

Antony and Cleopatra, II, 6.

Wilson and Preliminary Terms — Mr. Baker’s Second Film Effect —
A German Version — ^The Garbled Extract — President Wilson’s
Second Voyage — Change of Mood — ^Mr. Balfour’s Achieve-
ment — ^The Polish Report — ^End of the Council of Ten — ^The
Threatened Exodus — ^Mr. Lloyd George’s Memorandum of March
25 — ^M. Clemenceau’s Rejoinder — ^Mr. Baker’s Blunder — ^The
Triumvirate — ^The German Revolution — Germany’s Survival.

I T is pleasant to return to Paris after these Russian
snows. Unluckily we have also to return to Mr.
Stannard Baker.

Before President Wilson had departed, the question of
the renewal of the armistice on February 12 had directly
raised the issue of a preliminary peace. How much longer
were we aU to go on officially bound to hate the Germans,
and indeed, since the blockade was still in operation, to
starve them ? How much longer were schemes for regenera-
ting the world and the daily round of business to take
precedence of the commonplaces of good sense and humanity?
There must be peace, the armies must demobilize and the
troops come home. It was therefore necessary to fix the
final limits of German martial power while time remained.
It was agreed that a preliminary treaty, containing military,
naval and air terms, should be drafted forthwith by an
expert committee. The records show that Wilson said
' He did not wish his absence to stop so important, essential
and urgent a work as the preparation of a preliminary peace.
He hoped to return by March 13 or 15, allowing himself
only a week in America ; but he did not wish that during

184

THE TRIUMVIRATE 185

his unavoidable absence such questions as the territorial questions Mr. Baker's
and questions of compensation should be held up. He had Effect,
asked Colonel House to take his place while he was away.'

This statement was inconvenient for Mr. Staimard Baker.

It threatened to spoil his second film effect, which was as
follows :

‘No sooner had the President left Paris, on February
15, than the forces of opposition and discontent began to
act. On February 24, resolutions were adopted by the
Coimcil of Ten which, if carried through, would wreck the
entire American scheme for the peace.

‘ It was exceedingly shrewd strategy these skilled diplo-
matists played. They did not like the League as drafted
and they (fid not want the Covenant in the Treaty, but
they made no direct attack on either proposal. The League
was scarcely mentioned in the conferences until just before
the President returned.

‘ Their strategy was as simple as it was ingenious. They
had been left . . . with resolutions which the President
had strongly supported, to make qiuckly a preliminary
peace treaty, hwducfing only military, naval and air terms.

What was easier or more obvious than to generalize that
treaty, put into it also all the other terms that really
mattered to them — ^boimdaiies, reparations, colonies : in short
crowd the whole peace into the pr elimin ary treaty without
any reference to the League. ... If the League got
squeezed out in the process, or was consigned to some
innocuous future conference after all the settlements were
made, who cared?

‘ Thus while it is too much to say that there was a direct
plot, while Wilson was away, to kill the League or even
cut it out of the Treaty, one can affir m with certainty
that there was an intrigue against his plan of a preliminary
military and naval peace — ^which would have indirectly
produced the same result.

‘ It seemed that every militaristic and nationalistic force
came instantly to the front when Wilson had departed.

Lloyd George had gone home, but instead of leaving the
liberal leaders in control in Paris, men who were imbued
with the purposes laid down in the League — Cecil, Smuts,
and Barnes — ^who were indeed Lloyd George’s associates
on the British Peace Commission, he sent over Winston
Churchill, the most nailitaristic of British leaders. Churchill
was not a member of the peace delegation and had had
nothing before to do with the Peace Conference. Moreover,
he was a rampant opponent of the League. . ,

i86 THE WORLD CRISIS : the aftermath

A German
Version.

He proceeds to argue that Lloyd George, who ‘ began to
thinlf he had gone too far with this League business,’
gave instructions to Mr. Balfour to take advantage of
Ih-esident Wilson’s temporary absence for the purpose of
rupturing the policy of the League of Nations, and to
further these evil ends he sent specially to Paris the very
wicked author of this book.

This charge has had a wide currency. The German
writer Novak repeats it.

‘ Lord Balfour had actually forestalled President Wilson
in proposing that the Armistice terms should be renewed
without la5dng fresh obligations on the Germans. But that
was already a week ago. Since then Winston Churchill
had arrived in Paris, Churchill the Bolshevik-hater, still
filled with thoughts of war, filled with the same ideas as
Marshal Foch for a promising campaign in the East ;
full also of contempt for the League of Nations, which, he
declared with conviction, was useless to his country and
no substitute for a navy. . . . Subsequently there had
been an interchange of views between Winston Churchill
and Marshal Foch, and now Lord Balfour proposed that
after all it would be better at once to incorporate the
essentials of the peace terms in the Prehminciriesof Peace.’ ^

The correspondence printed in the last Chapter will have
sufficiently apprised the reader of the reasons which sent
me to Paris. They were the only reasons. The only
matter which concerned me at the three sessions which
I attended of the Supreme Coxmcil was the quest for some
policy in Russia. Absorbed in my own work, I was never
even aware of these more spacious issues. I went to
Paris on Russian business, and when it was dear no business
could be done, I went home.

Mr. Stannard Baker’s mettle is, however, best judged
from his own pages. It is necessary to his effect that
President Wilson should be depicted as leaving Europe
in the sure confidence that territorial and reparations
questions would not be dealt with in his absence, and that
such dealing would be a breach of faith. Yet there in the
Procis-verbal of February 12 stood the awkward words of
President Wilson, ‘ He did not wish that during his un-

Versailles, p.- 84.

THE TRIUMVIRATE 187

avoidable absence such questions as the territorial questions The Garbled
and questions of compensation should be held up,’ But E**^*^-
what of that ? A stroke of the pen will cut it out. It
does not fit the story. High ideals must be supported
at aU costs and by all methods. So the man to whom
President Wilson entrusted all his most secret papers,
with leave to publish as he pleased, in breach of aU faith
between the parties concerned, first garbles the record
by omitting the vital sentence and last perverts it by
inserting after the words preliminary peace ‘ as to military,
naval and air terms.’ The American author of ' Colonel
House’s Papers ’ has summed up this discreditable perform-
ance in some^salt sentences.

' The papers of Colonel House, like the British Foreign
Office Memorandum, furnish clear indication that in making
his charge of an intrigue, Mr. Baker has advanced assump-
tions and insinuations without a tittle of evidence. The
House papers show Wilson discussing with House the very
plans which Mr. Baker asserts “would wreck the entire
American scheme for the Peace.’’ They show House
cabling to Wilson the progress of those plans through the
Balfour resolutions, and in his cables of February 27 and
March 4 (cited above) explaining how he hoped to push
the future of the League. They show that in order to
maintain a semblance of probability in his charges against
the British Mr. Baker has been forced to omit essential
passages from the official record.’^

* * « * iK

It was a different President Wilson that crossed the
Atlantic in the George Washington for the second time.

He had had a rough time in the United States. The
White House Dinner to the Senate Foreign Relations Com-
mittee had revealed to him the implacable Party rancour
which he had provoked and by which he was pursued.

‘ Senators Knox and Lodge remained perfectly silent,
refusing to ask any questions or to act in the spirit in which
the dinner was given.’ * The Republicans had raised the
spirit of Monroe against the League of Nations. If a

1 Wfr. D. Hunter Miller also writes of Mir. Baier’s thesis, ' The
effort to prove a plot where none existed could not well go further.'

— ^The Drafting of the Covenant i, 98.

® House, p. 401.

i88 THE WORLD CRISIS : the aftermath

President

Wilson's

Second

Voyage.

quarrel arose between Spain and Brazil, or between England
and Venezuela, and the League of Nations said Brazil
or Venezuela were in the wrong, were the United States
to be compelled to take sides with a European Power,
sim ply because of impartial justice ? This was a hard
blow, and the President bent imder it. He felt hke General
Smuts, who saw clearly that the Mandatory System for
colonies was of universal application except in regard to
German South-West Africa.

At the Opera House in New York, the President, vexed
by the unpit5dng opposition which he knew he must en-
counter, had used an almost naked threat. The Covenant
of the League of Nations, he had suggested, would be so
intertwined with the Treaty that the two could not be
separated. The American reaction to this had been dis-
tinctly hostile. The George Washington this time carried
to Europe a man who had learned much. He now knew
that the wicked Old World statesmen were backed by even
more deplorable Old World nations and that the American
idealist would be repudiated by his own. The ‘ Teach the
world ’ theme was over ; the immediate need was to emerge
without discredit from exceedingly delicate and responsible
transactions. On his first voyage aU his moral indignation
had been concentrated upon the Old World, on the second
at least two-thirds of it was generously distributed to the
New. Then his purpose had been to compel the policies
of Europe to his views ; now it was the Senate of the
United States which stood in need of discipline. Indeed
he had almost a fellow-feeling for those European Statesmen
and diplomatists who, hke him, were at grips with unfair
intractable forces. Was it not time they should help each
other ? How could any solutions of world affairs be reached
if mobs and senates and five hundred gifted journalists
interfered ? Three or four men talking quietly on the
dead-level might avert breakdown and chaos if they acted
quickly. After all, Lloyd George and Clemenceau, the
trusted, acdaimed leaders of immense Parhamentary and
Democratic majorities, were not unworthy comrades.
He had met them now and he understood their quality
and the causes of their strength. He envied them their

THE TRIUMVIRATE 189

national credentials. They were concihatoiy, considerate,
earnestly desirous of his goodwill, and yet resolute in their
countries’ cause. He might not be able to give Justice
to the world, or even to define it in set terms, but the three
of them together could give Peace.

There is no authority for saying that these were the
reflections of President Wilson on his voyage ; it is mere
surmise ; all that is known is that on his arrival he was
far from pleased with Colonel House. House had already
adapted himself to the relaxing atmosphere of Europe. All
sorts of hitherto unauthorized ideas like ‘ We must settle
something,’ ' We vmsi face facts,’ ‘ Everyone must concede
a lot,’ had laid hold of the Colonel’s calm, benevolent, and
extremely practical mind. Wilson had not wished to see on
his second arrival at Brest, House’s finger pointing the path
which he had probably already himself resolved to tread.
So he said to House ‘ Your Dinner ’ \i.e. the Dinner you
suggested] to the Senate Foreign Relations Committee was
a failure as far as getting together was concerned.’

3}: * sic % 4:

What had happened while he had been away ? Mr.
Lloyd George had gone home. M. Clemenceau was, on
February 19, fired at and wounded by an Anarchist. He
was for some weeks incapacitated.

The Conunission appointed in February, on President
Wilson’s motion, to draw up prehminary naval, military
and air terms for Germany had been expected to report
'within 48 hours.’ They had, however, foimd the task
vastly more difficult than the President had expected.
A whole month had passed and the Generals and Admirals
were stfll in the midst of their labours. Meanwhile, how-
ever, IMr. Balfour who in the absence of the three Heads
of Governments became naturally the leading figure at
the Conference had made an immense effort to hasten
and conclude the work of the Commissions upon the rest
of the Peace Treaty. On February 22 he told the Supreme
Cotmcil that ' a general feeling of impatience was now
becoming manifest in all countries on account of the apparent
slow progress the Conference was making in the direction
of final peace.’ Supported by Lansing and House and

A Change of
Mood.

igo

THE WORLD CRISIS : the aftermath

Mr. Balfour’s with the assent of the still prostrate Clemenceau he obtained
from the Conference a resolution of which the first clause ran :

i. ‘Without prejudice to the decision of the Supreme
War Coimcil to present naval, military and air conditions
of peace to Germany at an early date, the Conference
agrees that it is desirable to proceed without delay to the
consideration of other preliminary peace terms with Germany
and to press on the necessary investigations with aU possible
speed.’

He also carried a motion that the work of theTerritorial Com-
missions should be completed and presented by March 8.

The whole of the real work of the Conference, driven
forward insistently from above, now began to advance
with remarkable rapidity. The Commissions which in the
lack of steady control had hitherto been ambling off in-
definitely into inquiries and discussions, now rallied to
precise commands to produce conclusions forthwith. From
every quarter early in March they began to present reports.
By the time Wilson returned (March 13), most of the great
territorial issues had reached the point when final decisions
could be taken by the chiefs. But the military terms which
were to have been so speedily disposed of were stiU lagging
on the road. It therefore became possible again to con-
template bringing the whole of the work on the treaty to
a common and simultaneous conclusion. There is no doubt
that Mr. Balfour had during his three weeks of virtual
ascendancy achieved an extraordinary transformation in
the whole position. Whereas in the middle of February
the work of the Conference was drifting off almost uncon-
trollably into futility, all was now brought back in orderly
fashion to the real. The decks were cleared for action and
the long-looked-for conflict of wills could now at last begin.

President Wilson at no time challenged the decisions
taken m his absence. On the contrary he approved with
increasing cordiality the work of the ‘ Balfour period ’ ; he
saw how scrupulously his own position had been safeguarded
by the steady and dexterous hands into which the Con-
ference had fallen. He realized that aU the main issues were
now presented uncompromised, intact, and ripe for decision.

But the Council of Ten (or Council of Fifty as it had

THE TRIUMVIRATE

191

become) was no instrument to settle or even discuss tbe
crucial questions between the Great Powers. An organism
more compact, more secret, more intimate, was imperatively
demanded, and to this the minds of all the chiefs were
driven by the steady pressure of facts. The actual crisis
arose upon the report of the Commission on the future
frontiers of Poland and Germany. The Commission among
other things had assigned the whole of Upper Silesia to
Poland as well as Dantzig and the PolMi corridor, Mr.
Lloyd George at once stigmatized the report as ‘ unjust,’
since according to the statistics of the Commission itself
the number of Germans to be assigned to PoHsh sovereignty
was too great. He therefore moved that the report should
be sent back to the Commission. The Commission recon-
sidered it, but refused to alter their recommendations.
The French championed the Commission. Tension rose
and leakage followed. Lord Northcliffe bitterly attacked
the Prime Minister in the Paris Daily Mail, urging that
he had no right to override the opinion of the experts
upon the Commission and revealing passages from his
statements in the secret discussions of the Council of Ten.
According to present-day opinion, Mr. Lloyd George was,
of course, entirely in the right. The proposals of the
Commission were indefensible. The members of the Com-
mission were not in any real sense of the word experts;
but whether or no, it is for experts to advise and for Ministers
and Heads of Governments to decide. Angered by the
leakages and Lord Northcliffe’s attacks, the Prime Minister
successfully broke up the Coundl of Ten. From March
20, President Wilson, Mr. Lloyd George, M. Clemenceau
and Signor Orlando met regularly in secret conversations,
at which not even secretaries were present. For the
first time since the conclusion of the armistice there began
that thorough and frank discussion which should have taken
place three months before. The Coundl of Ten (or Fifty)
was now reduced to the Five Foreign Ministers and still
continued for a while to meet ; but deprived of aU important
business and of all the mm who had the power to settle,
it perished painlessly of inanition.

We now reach a page of the Peace Conference story

The Polish
Report.

The

Threatened

Exodus.

193 THE WORLD CRISIS : the aftermath

wMch may well be called Exodus. As a prelude to accept-
ance of the brutal fact that they must agree, every one of the
‘ Big Four ’ threatened to quit the Conference. Mr. Lloyd
George was first and far the most artistic. He assigned
no specific point of disagreement. He was distressed at the
slow progress of the Treaty. He feared he was merely
wasting his time in Paris. Meanwhile he had direct and
urgent responsibilities in England. The Cabinet, the House
of Commons, the industrial situation — ^aU required his imme-
diate personal attention. Since no progress seemed likely
in Paris, he must return home and get on with his job.
He could come back later if there was any sign of some
practical . work being done upon the Treaty. He fixed
March 18 as the date of his departure. This prospect
and the suggestion that there was more important work
to be done in London than in Paris, filled his compeers
with alarm. They knew well that no progress could be
made in his absence. Yet the ground he had chosen was
unassailable. Every effort was made to persuade him
to remain. But it was not until he had received on March 17
a 'joint letter (since published by Colonel House) signed by
Wilson, Clemenceau and Orlando, begging him to remain
if only for another two weeks, that he was pleased to yield.
He consented to remain, but in a strengthened position.

Clemenceau and Wilson had long been ripening for a
trial of strength. House has made us aware of the striking
interchange which arose on March 28 out of the discussions
about the Saar Valley coalfields. ‘ ” Then if France does
not get what she wishes,” said the President, " she will
refuse to act with us. In that event do you wish me to
return home ? ” “ I do not wish you to go home,” said
Clemenceau, ” but I intend to do so myself,” and left the
house.’ In this rough fashion did the Tiger deal with his
opponent. Moreover, he had only to go round the
comer. But Wilson’s position was very different. To
recross the Atlantic was final and irrevocable. Never-
theless, in the face of Clemenceau’s continued threat to
withdraw the French delegation from the Conference, and
in the despondency following an attack of influenza, the
President telegraphed on April 7 for the George Washington

THE TRIUMVIRATE

193

to return to France. His faithful secretary, Mr. Tumulty,
who remained on guard at home, warned the President
in the bluntest terms that his exodus would he looked upon
by friends and foes in America as ‘ an act of impatience
and petulance . . . not accepted here in good faith . , .
most unwise and fraught with most dangerous possibiKties
... a desertion.’ This was decisive. He could not quit ;
he must go through with it. And meanwhile Clemenceau
had said no more about withdrawal and continued his
daily attendances upon the Conference.

The last exodus was that of Orlando. When upon the
question of Fiume President Wilson threatened to appeal
over his head to the Italian people, and on the strength
of his three-days’ visit to Italy exclaimed, ‘ I know the
Italian people better than you do.’ Orlando went straight
to the railway station and actually departed in voluble
indignation to Rome. He at least carried out his threat.
But this only consolidated the others. The Triumvirate
found a common ground in standing together against him.
After waiting a fortnight for appeals to his higher nature
which never arrived, he came back of his own accord

in time to sign the Treaty.

« * * « *

Mr. Lloyd George had remained in France, but while
the Cotmcil of Ten were fading away and the meetings
of the Four were gradually assuming a formal diaracter,
he paid a brief visit to Fontainebleau.^ There he wrote
his famous Memorandum of March 25. This document
has already been published, but since it expresses more
completely and explicitly Mr. Lloyd George’s sentiments
about the Peace Settlement, and since the views he expressed
corresponded very fairly with those , of the people in whose
name he spoke, it will be well to give some t37pical extracts
here :

‘ Some considerations for the Peace Conference before they
finally draft their terms.’

‘When nations are exhausted by wars in which they
have put forth all their strength and which leave them
tired, bleeding and broken, it is not difficult to patch up
1 Actually 24 hours only.

N

Mr. lloyd
George’s
Memoran-
dum.

Mr. Lloyd
George's
Memoran-
dum.

194 THE WORLD CRISIS : the aftermath

a peace that may last until the generation which experienced
the horrors of the war has passed away. Pictures of heroism
and triumph ordy tempt those who know nothing of the
sufferings and terrors of war. It is therefore comparatively
easy to patch up a peace which will last for thirty years.

‘ What is difficult, however, is to draw up a peace which
will not provoke a fresh struggle when those who have
had practical experience of what war means have passed
away. . . .

' To achieve redress our terms may be severe, they may
be stem and even rathless, but at the same time they can
be so just that the country on which they are imposed
will feel in its heart that it has no right to complain.
But injustice, arrogance, displayed in the hour of triumph,
will never be forgotten or forgiven.

‘ For these reasons I am, therefore, strongly averse to
transferring more Germans from German rule to the rule
of some other nation than can possibly be helped. I
cannot conceive any greater cause of future war than that
the German people, who have certainly proved themselves
one of the most vigorous and powerful races in the world,
should be surroimded by a number of small States, many
of them consisting of people who have never previously
set up a stable government for themselves, but each of them
containing large masses of Germans clamouring for reunion
with their native land. The proposal of the Polish Com-
mission that we should place 2,100,000 Germans under
the control of a people wMch is of a different religion and
which has never proved its capacity for stable self-govern-
ment throughout its history must, in my judgment, lead
sooner or later to a new war in the East of Europe. What
I have said about the Germans is equally true of the Magyars.
There will never be peace in South-Eastern Europe if every
little state now coming into being is to have a large Magyar
Irrendenta within its borders. I would therefore take
as a guiding principle of the peace that as far as is humanly
possible the different races should be allocated to their
motherlands, and that this human criterion should have
precedence over considerations of strategy or economics
or commimications, which can usually be adjusted by
other means. Secondly, I would say that the duration
for the pa3maents of reparation ought to disappear if pos-
sible with the generation which made the war. . . .

‘ The greatest danger that I see in the present situation
is that Germany may throw in her lot with Bolshevism
and place her resources, her brains, her vast organizing
power at the disposal of the revolutionary fanatics whose

THE TRIUMVIRATE 195

dream it is to conquer the world for Bolshevism by force Mr. Lloyd
of arms. This danger is no mere chimera. The present
Government in Germany is weak ; it has no prestige ; its dum.
authority is challenged; it Ungers merely because ttiere
is no alternative but the spartacists, and Germany is not
ready for spartacism as yet. But the argument which the
spartacists are using with great effect at this very time is
that they alone can save Germany from the intolerable
conditions which have been bequeathed her by the war.

They offer to free the German people from indebtedness
to the Allies and indebtedness to their own richer classes.

They offer them complete control of their own affairs and
the prospect of a new heaven and earth. It is true that
the price will be heavy. There will be two or three years
of anarchy, perhaps bloodshed, but at the end the land will
remain, the people wiU. remain, the greater part of the
houses and the factories will remain, and the railways and
the roads will remain, and Germany, having thrown off
her burdens, wiU be able to make a fresh start.

‘ If Germany goes over to the spartadsts it is inevitable
that she should throw in her lot with the Russian Bolsheviks.

Once that happens aH Eastern Europe will be swept into
the orbit of the Bolshevik revolution and within a year
we may witness the spectade of nearly three himdred
million people organized into a vast Red army under German
instructors and German generals equipped with German
cannon and German machine guns and prepared for a
renewal of the attack on Western Europe. This is a pros-
pect which no one can face with equanimity. Yet the
news which came from Hungary yesterday shows only
too dearly that this danger is no fantasy. And what are
the reasons alleged for this dedsion ? They are mainly
the belief that large numbers of Magyars are to be handed
over to the control of others. If we are wise, we shall offer
to Germany a peace, which, while just, will be preferable for
aU sensible men to the alternative of Bolshevism. I would,
therefore, put it in the forefront of the peace that once she
accepts our terms, espedaUy reparation, we will open to
her the raw materials and markets of the world on equal
tmns with ourselves, and will do ever3dhing possible to
enable the German people to get upon their legs again.

We cannot both cripple her and expect her to pay.

' Finally, we must offer terms which a responsible Govern-
ment in Germany can expect to be able to carry out. If
we present terms to Germany which are rmjust, or exces-
sivdy onerous, no responsible Government wiU sign them ;
certainly the present weak administration wUl not. ...

196 . THE WORLD CRISIS : the aftermath

Mr. Lloyd ‘ From every point of view, therefore, it seems to me
George’s ^ tha t we ought to endeavour to draw up a peace settlement
^ m oran- ^ jf .,^5 .^yere impartial arbiters, forgetful of the passions
of the war. This settlement ought to have three ends
in view. First of all it must do justice to the Allies by
fairing into account Germany’s responsibility for the origin
of the war and for the way in which it was fought. Secondly,
it must be a settlement which a responsible German Govern-
ment can sign in the belief that it can fulfil the obligations
it incurs. Thirdly, it must be a settlement which will
contain in itself no provocations for future wars, and which
will constitute an alternative to Bolshevism, because it
will commend itself to all reasonable opinion as a fair settle-
ment of the European problem. . . .

‘ To my mind it is idle to endeavour to impose a permanent
limitation of armaments upon Germany unless we are pre-
pared similarly to impose a limitation upon ourselves. . . .

‘ I should like to ask why Germany, if she accepts the
terms we consider just and fair, should not be admitted
to the League of Nations, at any rate as soon as she has
established a stable and democratic Government. Would
it not be an inducement to her both to sign the terms
and to resist Bolshevism ? Might it not be safer that she
should be inside the League than that she should be outside
it ?

‘ Finally, I believe that until the authority and effective-
ness of the League of Nations has been demonstrated, the
British Empire and the United States ought to give to
France a guarantee against the possibihty of a new German
aggression. France has special reason for asking for such
a guarantee. She has twice been attacked and twice
invaded by Germziny in half a century. She has been so
attacked because she has been the principal guardian of
liberal and democratic civilization against Central European
autocracy on the Continent of Europe. It is right that
the other great Western democracies should enter into an
undertaking which will ensure that they stand by her side
in time to protect her against invasion, should Germany
ever threaten her again or until the League of Nations has
proved its capacity to preserve the peace and liberty of
the world.

' If, however, the Peace Conference is really to secure
peace and prove to the world a complete plan of settle-
ment which all reasonable men will recognize as an alterna-
tive preferable to anarchy, it must deal with the Russian
situation. Bolshevik imperialism does not merely menace
the States on Russia's borders. It threatens the whole of

THE TRIUMVIRATE

197

Asia and is as near to America as it is to France. It
is idle to think that the Peace Conference can separate,
however sound a peace it may have arranged with Germany,
if it leaves Russia as it is to-day. I do not propose, how-
ever, to complicate the question of the peace with Germany
by introducing a discussion of the Russian problem. I
mention it simply in order to remind ourselves of the
importance of dealing with it as soon as possible.’

Clemenceau replied with asperity in writing. He sug-
gested that Lloyd George’s magnanimity was achieved
exclusively at the expense of France and the continental
States, while England had received all the advantages
and securities which were of interest to her.

‘ But what would be the results of following the method
suggested by the note of March 26 ? A certain number of
total and definitive guarantees will be acquired by maritime
nations which have not known an invasion. The surrender
of the German colonies would be total and definitive. The
surrender of the German navy would be total and definitive.
The smrender of a large portion of the German merchant
fleet would be toted and definitive. The exclusion of Ger-
many from foreign markets would be total and would last
for some time. On the other hand, partial eind temporary
solutions would be reserved for the continental countries ;
that is to say, those which have suffered most from the
weir. The reduced frontiers suggested for Poland and
Bohemia world be partial solutions. The defensive agree-
ment offered to France for the protection of her territory
would be a temporary solution. The proposed regime for
the coal-fields of the Saar would be temporary. Here we
have a condition of inequality which might risk leaving
a bad impression upon the after-war relations between the
Allies, more important than the after-war relations between
Germany and the AUies.’

Mr. Stannard Baker had the Lloyd George Memorandum
before him when he wrote his History. He admired it
greatly. ' A peace resting upon military coercion could
never,’ he felt, ‘ be anything but a curse to the world.’
‘ No finer expression of this feeling,’ he wrote, ‘ based on
a far-sighted perception of the verities of the situation
can be found than in a memorandum sent to President
Wilson by General Tasker H. Bliss on March 25.’ It was
called ‘ Some Considerations for the Peace Conference

M. Clemen-
ceau 's
Rejoinder.

Mr. Baker's
Blunder.

198 THE WORLD CRISIS : the aftermath

before they finally draft their Terms.’ A few pregnant
sentences may be quoted, etc. ... ‘ General Bliss,’ he
continues, ‘ was one of the few Members of the Conference
that never lost his sense of perspective and who saw that
there was a great danger of ruining the whole work of
peace if the Conference should produce a treaty against
which the mass of German opinion would at once revolt.’

This is probably the most astonishing blimder which
any man claiming to write a standard history, and armed
for that purpose with a mass of exclusive official and
authentic information, has ever committed. Little did
Mr. Baker dream when he peimed his tributes to General
Bliss that they should really have been directed to another
address. Bitter must have been his chagrin when he realized
that his praise belongs not to the distinguished American
soldier whom all respect, but to an unregenerate Old World
politician.

This is the concluding specimen of Mr. Baker’s fidelity
in the search of Truth with which the reader will be troubled.
I have dwelt upon his work with attention because of the
solemn character of the mission entrusted to him and the
stream of precious knowledge placed in his charge by President
Wilson. It is disquieting to think how many conscientious
citizens of the United States must have drunk from his
infected formtain. But fortunately it has not been left to
English writers to discredit Mr. Baker, The pages of Dr.
Hunter Miller and of the Editor of Colonel House’s Papers
have remorselessly exposed his errors, and indeed vices, to
the alert, critical faculty of the American public and to
their inherent desire for Truth and Justice.

♦ ♦ ♦ ♦ ♦

It is not the purpose of these Chapters to re-teU the
story of the Peace Conference, but only to guide the reader to
some of its sahent features. We have, nevertheless, surveyed
the general scene and its actors. Nearly five months have
passed since the fighting ended and it is only now that the
real making of the Peace begins. Four men, for a time to
be reduced to three, each the responsible head of a great
victor State, are all that are left. The five hundred gifted
journalists, the twenty-seven eager nations, the Council of

THE TRIUMVIRATE

199

Ten (or Fifty), the fifty-eight Commissions, so rich in eminent
personages, have adl melted down to three men. Hence-
forward they will stand together. They have learned to
respect each other and to trust each other; they have
become colleagues and comrades in an adventure of much
danger and unequalled difficulties. Each knows he must
make serious concessions to reach agreement. Each knows
that agreement must be reached ; and all resolve to give
a speedy peace to the world and answer imitedly, promptly,
and to the best of their ability, for good or for iU, the hundred
hard questions which stand open.

We shall see in the next chapter what some of these
questions were and how they were decided. For a month
(March 20-ApriI 19) they argue and consult alone, all speak-
ing English. Much common groimd is won : but it is not
entrenched each night. Even the rendezvous of the Four
sometimes fail. One goes to M. Clemenceau's rooms and
one to President Wilson’s. Organization now alone is
needed. Then they admit as secretary, Maurice Hankey.
He listens to all that is said and keeps his record and tells
them at the end of eveiy day what they have settled. From
that moment their decisions flow out to jurists and officials in
a swiftly growing stream. By May 7 the Treaty of Ver-
sailles is printed and on the 9th a Plenary Session of the
Conference accepts with resignation or resentment the
accomplished fact.

9|e ♦ 4: 4: a|e

It was now time to summon the enemy. Early in May
the German envo}^ presented themselves m the Palace of
Versailles to receive the volume in which the preliminary
terms of Peace were incorporated ; and at the end of Jime,
peace in substantial accordance with these terms was duly
signed.

Meanwhile Germany had been traveUing fast. German
writers are prone to dwell upon the humiliations their people
endured at the hands of the conquerors in this period. But
their own coimtry was all the while the scene of events most
important and helpful to them and to civilization. Some
brief account has been given in these pages of the Russian
revolution. The German revolution was the paroxysm of

The Trium-
Yirate*

300 THE WORLD CRISIS : the aftermath

The Geman an incomparably stronger and more highly-nerved organiza-

Revolntion. passed across our anxious, satiated, jaded con-

sciousness with no more attention than surviving troops just
withdrawn into rest quarters after battle would pay to a
distant cannonade. The story requires a book to teU. The
interest is enhanced by comparison with what happened in
Russia. So many of the conditions and episodes and their
sequence are exactly reproduced. The nation is beaten in
war, the Fleet and Army mutiny and dissolve, the Emperor
is deposed, and Authority bankrupt is repudiated by all.
Workmen’s and soldiers' councils are set up, a Socialist
Government is hustled into o£&ce ; upon the famine-stricken
homeland return millions of soldiers quivering from long-
drawn torment, aching with defeat. The Police have
disappeared ; industry is at a standstill ; the mob are
hungry; it is winter. All the agencies which destroyed
Russia are ready. They are organized; each individual
knows his task ; the whole procedure of Communist revolu-
tion is understood and scheduled. The Russian experiment
stands as a model. In Karl Liebknecht, in Rosa Luxemburg,
in Dittmann, in Kautsky and a score of others are the would-
be Lenins and Trotsk5/sof the Teutonic agony. Everything
is tried and ever3dhing happens ; but it does not happen the
same way.

The Communists seize the greater part of the capital; but
the seat of government is defended. The would-be constitu-
tional assembly is attacked; but the assailants are repulsedl
A handful of loyal officers — ^loyal to Germany — disguised
as privates, but weU armed with grenades and machine-guns,
guard with their lives the frail nucleus of civic government.
They are only a handful; but they win. A naval division
infected with Bolshevism seizes the Palace; they are
expelled, after bloody fighting, by faithful troops. In the
mutinies which overturned authority in almost every regi-
ment, the officers were deprived of their Epaulettes and
swords ; but not one was murdered.

In the midst of all we discern a rugged, simple figure.
A Socialist workman and Trade Unionist — ^Noske by name.
Appointed Minister of National Defence by the Social-
Demoantic Government, furnished by them with dictatorial

THE TRIUMVIRATE

201

powers, he does not fail the German people. A foreign
opinion of German heroes is necessarily very detached and
can only be expressed with diffidence ; but in the long line
of kings, statesmen and warriors which stretches from
Frederick to Hindenburg it may be that Noske has his place
— a son of the people, amid universal confusion acting
without fear in the public cause.

The fibre and intellect of ' aU the German tribes ' enabled
the Provisional Government to hold elections. Always the
reader will see in these pages the same tactics by the same
forces : their one object — ^to prevent the people from
choosing a Parliament. In Russia they have succeeded : in
Germany they fail. Presently we shall see them fail in
Ireland.

Representative government being still alive, thanks to
shot and steel, machine-guns, trench mortars, dead Jlammen-
werfer, thirty millions of German men and women, 90 per
cent of the electorate, recorded their votes, and from that
hour a free and supreme Parliament became the central fact
in German life.

It was therefore as a united nation which in the hour of
disaster had risen superior to despair, that Germany came
to Versailles.

Germany’s

Survival.

CHAPTER XI

The

Temtorial

Settlements.

THE PEACE TREATIES 1

' Thmgh we had Peace, yet ’twill be a great while ere things
be settled. Though the Wind lie, yet after a Storm the Sea
will work a great while.’

Selden’s Table Talk.

The Territorial Settlements — The Ontstanding Features — ^National
Self-determination — Its Application — Alsace-Lorraine — Schles-
wig — ^The Rebirth of Poland — The Eastern Frontier of Germany
— ^Upper Silesia — ^The British Empire Delegation — Its Modera-
tion — Mr. Lloyd George's Handicap — ^The Upper Silesian
Plebiscite — What Britain Risked — The Case of France — ^The
French Demand for Security — ^The Rhine Frontier — The
Disarmament of Germany — ^Ihe Demilitarized Zone — ^The
Joint Guarantee — Its Sequel — ^The Fate of Austria-Hungary —
The Innocent and the Guilty — Czechoslovakia : The Czechs
— Czechoslovakia : The Slovaks — Jugo-Slavia — Rumania —
Hungary — Austria — The Anschluss — Bulgaria — ^The General
Design.

H owever keen may be the feelings excited by the
distribution of tropical colonies, of compensation in
money or in kind and of retributive justice ; high as are
the hopes centred in the League of Nations, it is by the
territorial settlements in Europe that the Treaties of 1919
and 1920 will finally be judged. Here we are in contact
with those deep and lasting facts which cast races of men
into moulds and fix their place and status in the world.
Here we stir the embers of the past and light the beacons
of the future. Old flags are raised anew ; the passions of
vanished generations awake; beneath the shell-tom soil
of the twentieth century the bones of long dead warriors
and victims are exposed, and the wail of lost causes sounds
in the wind.

The treaties with which we now have to deal take their
^ See Map of Europe to face page 230.

m

THE PEACE TREATIES

203

place in the great series which includes the Treaty of The 9ut-
Westphalia, the Treaty of Utrecht and the Treaties of
Vienna. They are at once the latest and the largest link
in the chain of European history. They will be memorable
for three events of the first magnitude : the dissolution of
the Austro-Himgarian Empire ; the rebirth of Poland ;
and the preservation of united Germany. Even the short
distance we have travelled since the Conference in Paris
reveals the scale of these monarch-peaks, and how they
tower above the range and dominate the wide regions of
mountainous and hilly country. Already through the
clearer air we can discern the proportions of the vast land-
scape and its massive simplicity. The Empire of Charles V,
and with it the Hapsburg Monarchy, the survivor of so
many upheavals, the main structure of central and southern
Europe, is represented only by a chasm. The three sundered
parts of Poland are re-united into a sovereign independent
Republic of thirty million souls ; and Germany, beaten
and disarmed upon the field of battle, defenceless before
her outraged conquerors, rises the largest and incomparably
the strongest racial mass in Europe.

These dominant facts in the life of Europe did not spring
solely, or even mainly, from the volcanic violence of the
war. They were the restilt of the methodical application of a
principle. If the treaty makers of Vienna in 1814 were
ruled by the principle of Legitimacy, those of Paris in 1919
were guided by the principle of Self-determination. Al-
though the expression ‘ Self-determination ’ wiU. rightly be
forever connected with the name of President Wilson, the
ideal was neither original nor new. The phrase itself is
Fichte’s ‘ Selbst bestimmung* Tlie conception has never been
more forcefully presented than by Mazzani. Throughout the
British Empire it had long been known and widely practised
under the somewhat less explosive precepts of ' Self-govern-
ment ’ and ' Government by Consent '. During the nine-
teenth century the rise of Nationalism made it increasingly
plain that all great Empires must reckon with this principle
and increasiugly conform to it, if they were to survive
united and vital in the modem world. The almost complete
exclusion of religion in all its forms from the political sphere

204

THE WORLD CRISIS : the aftermath

National

Self-deter-

mination.

had left Nationalism the most powerful moulding instrument
of mankind in temporal affairs.

The Fourteen Points embodied and proclaimed the
principle of Self-determination. In his speeches the Presi-
dent had declared that ‘national aspirations must be
respected. Peoples may now be dominated and governed
only by their own consent. Self-determination is not a
mere phrase.’ ‘ Peoples and provinces are not to be bartered
about from sovereignty to sovereignty. . . . Every terri-
torial settlement must be made in the interest and for the
benefit of the populations concerned. . . . All weU-defined
and national aspirations shall be accorded the utmost
satisfaction that can be accorded them without introducing
new or perpetuating old elements of discord and antagonism.’
Ihe Allies had earnestly identified their war aims with
this declaration. The Germans had accompanied their
requests for an armistice by the conditions that the peace
settlement diould be based upon the Fourteen Points of
President Wilson and his other speeches. They had even
claimed that they laid down their arms and rendered
themselves defenceless upon this understanding. Therefore
the principle of Self-determination was at once what the
victors had fought for and the vanquished claimed.

Here was one clear guiding principle upon which all the
peoples so cruelly sundered, so tom with wounds and hatreds,
were united, and to which all were boimd both by faith
and interest. The main and imperative duty of the Peace
Conference, in all matters comprised in their task of making
peace between the belligerents, was to give effect to this
principle ; or in words which I venture to requote, ‘ to
liberate the captive nationalities, to reunite those branches
of the same family which had long been arbitrarily divided,
and to draw frontiers, in broad accordance with the ethnic
masses.’

All being agreed upon the fundamental principle, it
remained to apply it. But if the principle was simple and
accepted, its application was difficult and disputable. What
was to be the test of nationality ? How were the wi^es
of national elements ’ to be expressed and obtained ?
How and where were the resulting frontiers , to be drawn

THE PEACE TREATIES

205

amid entangled populations ? To what extent should the its Appii-
main principle override every other consideration — his-
torical, geographical, economic or strategic ? How far
could the armed and vehement forces which were every-
where afoot be brought to accept the resulting decisions ?

Such were the problems of the Peace Conference, and in
particular of the Triumvirate.

In the main it was decided that language should be
adopted as the proof of nationality. No doubt language
is not always its manifestation. Some of the most nationally
conscious stocks can scarcely speak their own language at
all, or only with the greatest difl&culty. Some oppressed
races spoke the language of their oppressors, while hating
them ; and some dominant breeds spoke the language of
.their subjects, while ruling them. Still matters had to
be settled with reasonable dispatch, and no better guide
to the principle of nationality in disputed cases could be
formd than language ; or, as a last resort, a plebiscite.

It was inherent in the realities that the scheme of draw-
ing frontiers in accordance with nationality as defined by
language or with the wish of the local inhabitants could
not in practice be applied without modification. Some
of the new States had no access to the sea through their
own populations, and could not become effective economic
units without such access. Some liberated nationalities
had for centuries looked forward to regaining the ancient
frontiers of their long vanished sovereignty. Some of
the victors were entitled by treaty to claim, and others of
the victors bound by treaty to accord them, frontiers fixed
not by language or the wish of the inhabitants, but by
Alps. Some integral economic communities lay athwart the
ethnic frontier ; and at many points rival and hostile races
' were intermingled, not only as individuals but by villages,
by towndiips and by rural districts. AH this debatable
grormd had to be studied and fought over mile by mile
by the numerous, powerful and violently agitated States
concerned.

Nevertheless all these reservations and impingements
upon the fundamental principle affected only the outskirts
of peoples and countries. All the disputable areas put

Alsace-

Loiraine.

206 THE WORLD CRISIS : the aftermath

together were but a minute fraction of Europe. They were
but the exceptions which proved the rule. Fierce as were
and are the irritations which have arisen wherever these
sensitive and doubtful fringes of nationality have been
roughly clipped by frontier scissors, they do not impair
the broad essence of the treaties. Probably less than 3
per cent, of the European population are now living under
Governments whose nationality they repudiate ; and the
map of Europe has for the first time been drawn in general
harmony with the wishes of its peoples.

Ill * « * >i<

Let us now test these assertions by examining the actual
frontiers of Germany fixed by the Treaty of Versailles. Let
us begin with the western and northern frontiers.

Point VIII of the Fourteen stated that ‘ tha wrong done
to France fty Prussia in 1871 in the matter of Alsace-Lorraine,
which has unsettled the peace of the world for nearly fifty
years, should he righted.’ This had become one of the prime
objects of the Allies after the war had broken out. It
was explicitly accepted by Germany when she asked, for
peace on the basis of the Fourteen Points and signed the
Armistice accordingly. There was therefore no dispute
about Alsace-Lorraine. These two provinces, after being
French for nearly two hundred years, had been wrested
from France in 1871 against the wishes of their inhabitants.
They had been, to use the words embodied in the Treaty,
' separated from their coimtry in spite of the solemn protests
of their representatives at the Assembly of Bordeaux.'
The retrocession of Alsace-Lorraine was the repairing of a
breach in the principle of Self-determination committed
within living memory.

Apart from an insignificant alteration of the Belgian
frontier around Eupen and Malm^dy, no other change was
made in the Western frontiers of Germany. The French had
vehemently claimed in addition to Alsace and Lorraine
the annexation of the district of the Saar with its very
valuable coalfields. They founded their claim at first upon
historical grounds. President Wilson’s refusal to endorse
it, against the reputed wish of the inhabitants, led to one

THE PEACE TREATIES

207

of the notable crises in the discussions of the Triumvirate. Schleswig.
The French then fell back upon a demand for the temporary
use of the coalfields in the Saar Valley to compensate
them for the destruction of the French, mining districts
at Lens and Valenciennes. They themselves proposed
that the ultimate destination of the Saar Valley should
be determined by the vote of the inhabitants themselves
taken in the year 1935. There are no grounds whatever
of principle upon which the resulting agreement of the
Conference can be assailed.

Upon the northern or Danish frontier one other cession
of territory was required of Germany. When, after the
defeat of Denmark by Prussia in 1864, Schleswig and Holstein
were surrended by Denmark to Prussia and Austria, a
clause had been inserted at the instance of Napoleon III
in the Treaty, that the inhabitants of Northern Schleswig
should be consulted upon whether they desired to be Danish
or German. This only accorded with justice. The Duchy
of Holstein was and had always been purely German. The
south of Schleswig had been gradually Germanized, but
the north remained Danish in speech and Danish in senti-
ment. The stipulation of the Treaty had never been
carried out. The inhabitants of Northern Schleswig were
never consulted, and Prussia had at a later date freed
herself from the legal obligation. Now was clearly the
time to repair this injustice and the permanent estrange-
ment between Denmark and Germany which had resulted
from it. There were some who would have desired that
the whole of Schleswig should be separated from Germany,
in order so to arrange the frontier that the Kiel Canal
should cease to run entirely through German territory.

The prudence of the Danish Govermnent set all such designs
on one side. They desired to receive into the Danish
nation only those districts whose people felt themsdves to
be Danes. They rejected aU suggestions that a German-
speaking population should be unwillingly incorporated
in Denmark. Accordingly it wais agreed that the future
frontiers should be drawn by the free vote of the popula-
tion given in a plebiscite.

Let us now turn to the eastern frontier of Germany.

208

THE WORLD CRISIS : the aftermath

The Rebirth Here we encounter one of the great new facts. Only a
of Poland. pj-Qjjjgy could have brought about the rebirth of Poland.

Before that event could come to pass, it was necessary
that every single one of the three military Empires which
had partitioned Poland should be simultaneously and
decisively defeated in war, or otherwise shattered. If
the Powers which had devoured Poland stood together in
a Drei-Kaiserlund, there was no force in the world which
would or could have challenged them. If they warred on
opposite sides, at least one would emerge among the victors
and could not be despoiled of its possessions. But the
astounding triple event had occurred : Russia had shattered
Austria ; the Bolsheviks, aided by Germany, had destroyed
Russia; and Germany herself had been overpowered by
France and the English-speaking world. So all three parts
of sundered Poland were free at the same moment ; and
all their chains — Russian, German and Austrian — ^fell to
the ground in a single dash. The hour of Destiny had
struck ; and the largest crime of European history, trium-
phantly persisted in through six generations, was now to
pass away. Point XHI had declared that ‘ an independent
Polish State should be erected, which should include the
territories inhabited by indisputably Polish populations, which
should be assured a free and secure access to the sea.’ Germany
had accepted this. Indeed her own claim for ethnic in-
tegrity was based upon the very principle which recreated
the undent State of Poland.

But with the best will in the world the drawing of a
frontier between Germany and Poland could not be free
from anomaly and injustice. The great plain which
stretched from Warsaw to Berlin was marked by no physical
barrier. Along a belt of four hundred miles the population
was mixed in varying proportions. It had been the policy
of Germany to colonize Poland with German settlers.
German capital, science and ability had created a vigorous
industrial life. Their culture, thrust forward with the power
of an armed and militant Empire, had everywhere made its
impr^ion upon the conquered and partitioned population.
The Germans pointed to the obvious benefits which
their rule had conferred on Prussian Poland ; the Poles

THE PEACE TREATIES

209

declared this was the mere usufruct of a stolen inherit- The Eastern
ance. It was the task of the Peace Conference, of the ceimany,
Poland Conunission, and finally of the Triumvirate to
draw the line.

The problem divided itself into three sections : the
centre, the north and the south. The task of the Poland
Commission was to determine which districts were inhabited
by an indisputably Polish population. Plebiscites were
convenient for well-marked districts, but no plebiscite was
possible throughout this great belt of country whose boxmd-
aries were indefinite. To seek such a plebiscite would
have involved occupying the whole area by impartial British,

French and American troops. But the Americans were
going home ; the British had demobilized so fast that
they could scarcely spare half a dozen battalions ; and
the French avowed themselves Polish champions. In the
centre, therefore, which broadly comprised the Piussian
province of Posen, the only basis was the German statistics.

No doubt these were more than discounted by the not
unnatural anti-German bias of the victors. But upon the
whole the line was drawn with the desire to assign to Ger-
many the fewest possible number of Poles, and to Poland
the fewest possible number of Germans.

More (hflBculty arose in the north. The province of
East Prussia, though originally in the nature of a German
colonial conquest, had become a purely German land whose
population was animated above all other parts of Germany
by the spirit of intense Nationalism. This province was
separated from the rest of Germany by a strip or corridor
running down to the sea, in which from all accounts there
appeared to be a Polish-speaking majority. The Poles
demanded large portions of East Prussia from Germany,
and for the rest suggested that this small island of Ger-
man people should be made a republic with its capital at
KSnigsberg. This demand was rejected. But the Polish-
speaking corridor was joined to Poland, not only on
grounds of language but as the most obvious means of
giving Poland that access to the sea which had been accepted
by all parties to the Fourteen Points.

Adjoining the corridor was the great dty of Dantzig

o

210 THE WORLD CRISIS : the aftermath

iahabited by two hundred thousand Germans, which was
the natural outlet to the sea for the whole trade of the
Valley of the Vistula, The Commission originally proposed
to transfer Dantzig absolutely to Polish sovereignty, so
that the inhabitants of Dantzig would be subject to Polish
legislation and to compulsory service in the Polish Army.
Through Mr. Lloyd George’s exertions a solution was
found by which Dantzig was restored to the old position
it had held for five hundred years as a self-governing civic
State, united by close ties with Poland but with autonomous
sovereign control over its whole internal administration
and government. Dantzig was to be a free city, but it
was to enter the Polish Custom system and the Poles were
to have the administration of the great harbour. This
ingenious and complicated expedient did not give complete
satisfaction to either side. But it is not easy to see what
better method could have been adopted.

In this northern section of the frontier two minor points
of difficulty must be mentioned. East Prussia had been
preserved to Germany, but certain districts on its southern
borders contained considerable Polish-speaking populations
and were claimed by Poland. For these districts of AUen-
stein and Marienwerder a plebiscite was prescribed. The
majority voted to remain with Germany, and their wish
was law. Lastly the small port and district of Memel,
situated on the other side of the river Niemen, was the only
means by which Lithuania could obtain that outlet to the sea
without which it could not exist as an independent State.
It was hoped that the Lithuanians would voluntarily join
themselves once more to Poland. This they refused, and
could not be compelled. Thus eventually Memel, a German
town of about 30,000 inhabitants, surrounded by rural
districts largely Lithuanian-speaking, was eventually as-
signed to Lithuania, under elaborate securities for local
autonomy.

We have still to consider the southern section of the
German-Polish frontier; and here upon the question of
Upper Silesia another of the great disputes of the Con-
ference occurred. The draft Treaty presented to the
Germans prescribed the absolute cession of Upper Silesia,

THE PEACE TREATIES

3II

after the Ruhr the richest iron and coal district in the The British
German Empire, to the Poles. This was the greatest blot ^e^tion.
upon the draft Treaty with Germany. The rest was implicit
in the acceptance of the Fourteen Points ; but the enforced
cession of the whole of Upper Silesia was received with
vehement German resentment and indeed with general
surprise.

* * * * *

The conflicts of the Triumvirate, now rejoined by Italy,
which had marked the framing of the pre limin ary peace
terms did not end with their presentation to Germany.

The Germans protested by every means in their power
against the Financial and Economic clauses, against the
clauses compeUing their avowal of war guilt and the sur-
render of war criminals. In the territorial q)here they
complained chiefly of the cession of Upper Silesia. It
seemed possible that they would refuse to sign the treaty,
and thus force the Allies into a military occupation of
Berlin and other important centres, or a prolongation of
the blockade, or both. Such a course presented no im-
mediate military difficulty but very grave political dangers.

No one could teU how long an occupation would last. Until
it ended very large numbers of soldiers must be kept under
arms and further demobilization indefinitely suspended.

On June i Mr. Lloyd George, wishing to strengthen
himself in his efforts to obtain a mitigation of the peace
terms, convened a meeting in Paris of the British Empire
Delegation. The whole Empire was represented together
with the principal British Departments of State. General
Smuts made a powerful appeal for clemency. When my
turn came, I supported him by arguments of a different
character. As Secretary of State for War I had a fecial
point of view.

I stated that

‘ there were the most serious difficulties either in re-imposing
the blockade or in govenxing the whole territoiy of Germany
and undertaking the solving of local pohtical problems.

A foreign garrison would never make the Germans work
unitedly and effectively. The weapons of blockade and
occupation were mutually exclusive. If you occupied the

212

Its

Moderation.

THE WORLD CRISIS : the aftermath

country, you would have to feed the people in the territory
held and this could not be done under blockade. If the
Allies entered Germany and occupied the country, it would
be necessary to have conscription indefinitely. It was
impossible to control the internal life of Germ^y without
maintaining compulsory service [for Great Britain]. The
pressure to obtain the release of men from the army was
already indescribable. The very classes who were calling
most loudly for extreme terms to be imposed upon Germany
were those who were the most anxious to get men out of
the army.’

Accordingly I urged that further negotiations should
take place and ‘implored the Delegation to cast their
opitiion in the direction of giving their plenipotentiaries
the greatest possible liberty to make a “ split the difference ”
Peace’ [on the points outstanding]. The Chancellor of
the Exchequer, Mr. Chamberlain; the Lord Chancellor,
Lord Birkenhead and others spoke to the same purpose.

Although there were many gradations of opinion the
will of the Delegation was unanimous. It was resolved
that the Prime Minister in his negotiations should press
for concessions to be made to the enemy in the treaty of
peace. In particular: Amendment of the proposals for
the Eastern frontier of Germany, leaving to Germany
districts preponderantly German and providing for a
plebiscite in doubtful cases ; Extension to Germany of the
right to enter the League of Nations at an early date :
Reduction in the numerical strength of the Army of Occupa-
tion : Modification of the reparation clauses and the fixing
of the German liability at a definite amount.

The Delegation in a mood of strong conviction further
authorized the Prime Minister in the event of resistance
on the part of any of his colleagues on the Council of Four,

‘ to use the full weight of the entire British Empire even
to the point of refusing the services of the British Army
to advance into Germany, or the services of the British
Navy to enforce the blockade of Germany.’

This seemed to be a memorable occasion.

Mr. Lloyd George was thus strongly armed for all the
future discussions : and he would probably have succeeded
in improving the treaty in an even greater degree but for

THE PEACE TREATIES

213

his btirden of repaxation pledges. Tbe crazy echoes of Mr. Lloyd
the General Election were a humiliating handicap both to hL^^p.
the Prime Minister and Great Britain. Clemenceau, Wilson
and Orlando imderstood the position perfectly. When .

Wilson was rallied with placing Germans under Polish,
Czechoslovak or Italian rule ; when Clemenceau was re-
proached for vindictiveness or Orlando for territorial appe-
tite, each had his retort. A sarcastic smile, a shrug of the
shoulders, some reference to the difi&culties of democratic
electioneering were quite sufficient to place the Big Four
upon an equality, and at a lower level.

All the time the odd fact was that however many thousand
millions Germany paid. Great Britain was only to receive
a very small fraction, less than half the share of France
and subject to Belgian priority ; and that, scarcely two years
later, she was to proclaim the principle, revived from the
wisdom of an aristocratic past, that all war debts ought to
be simultaneously extinguished by universal consent with
consequent reactions upon reparations.

A prolonged conflict ensued about Silesia. President
Wilson and the French championed the claims of Poland.

England asserted the rights of Germany and invoked the
principle of Self-determination. The President’s bias in
favour of Poland was as marked as his prejudices against
the Italians. Cynics pointed to the fact that Italian
emigrants to America usually return to Italy without
acquiring voting rights, while the Polish vote was a formid-
able factor in the domestic politics of the United States.

Be this as it may, Mr. Wilson had made up his mind that
Poland should have Upper Silesia and he resented all
opposition. However in this field Mr. Lloyd George was
unhampered by British electioneering and in spite of the
persistent attacks of the Northcliffe Press his efforts and
persuasion prevailed. The principle of a plebiscite was
conceded to the Germans in the final Treaty, which is
thus cleared from reproach in this respect.

It is worth while to describe briefly the outcome.

A plebiscite was eventually held in 1920 under the
authority of British and French troops. While these
were occupying the disputed zones and preparing for the

214

THE WORLD CRISIS: the aftermath

The Upper voting, a violent incursion of Poles under one Korfanty,
a former Polish deputy of the Reichstag, was organized
with the object of preventing the election. The Germans
were not slow to retaliate with a similar inroad. A sort of
civil war broke out in which British troops S3maphathized
with the Germans and the French with the Poles. Matters
thus came to a dangerous and ludicrous pass. However, law
and good sense prevailed. The plebiscite was duly taJcen,
and a German maj ority of 6 to 4 declared itself. When these
results were brought before the Supreme Council no agree-
ment could be reached. The Americans had gone home,
and England and France were in obstinate equipoise. The
deadlock was resolved by an agreement to refer the issue
to the Council of the League of Nations. This was the
first occasion upon which a dispute between two of the
greatest Powers had been relegated to the new instrument.
The Council, sundered by the differences between England
and France, in its turn devolved the decision upon a Com-
mission consisting of the representatives of the smaller
states, who though on the Council of the League were not
involved in the discussions of the Supreme Council of the
Allies. A Belgian, a Spaniard, a Brazilian and a Chinese
were entrusted with this delicate and thorny problem. Under
all the pressures which were brought to bear this body took
refuge in a compromise. Their decision was bitterly resented
by Germany, but accepted as binding by England and
France. It is not easy to see what other procedure could
have been followed.

Judged by Gladstonian standards, Germany issued
from the war and the peace with many positive advantages.
She had in fact realized all the main objectives of British
Liberal policy in the Victorian era. Defeat has given the
German people effective control of their own affairs. The
Imperialist system has been swept away. A domestic
self-determination has been achieved. A parliamentary
system based on universal suffrage to which the rulers of
Germany are effectively responsible may be some consola-
tion for the loss of twenty-two kings and princes. The
abolition of compulsory mihtary service has always seemed
to British eyes a boon and not an injury. The restriction

THE PEACE TREATIES

315

of armaments enforced by treaties upon Germany is to-day
extolled as the highest goal to which all nations should
aspire. The absurd and monstrous economic and financial
chapters of the Treaty of Versailles have already been
swept almost entirely into limbo ; they have either lapsed
or have been superseded by a series of arrangements in-
creasingly based on facts, on good sense and on mutual
agreement. The sufferings of the German bourgeois and
rentier classes, the humble pensioner, the thrifty annuitant,
the retired toiler, the aged professor, the brave of&cer —
which resulted from the act of repudiation involved in the
destruction of the mark largely by the German Government
themselves — are piteous. They may affront the justice of
the German State ; they have not weakened the pulsations
of the German heart, nor the productive vitality of German
industry, nor even the credit and saving power of the German
people. Germany has lost her colonies, but she was a
late-comer on the colonial scene. She possessed no territory
over-seas in which the German race could live and multiply.
‘ Foreign plantations,’ to quote the old-fashioned English
phrase, in tropical lands might be a source of pride and
interest and certainly of expenditrure. They were in any
case hostages to a stronger sea-power. Their alienation
in no way impaired the German strength and very doubtfully
improved the fortunes of their new possessors.

Contrast for a moment the position which Germany
occupies to-day with the doom which would have fallen
upon the British Empire and upon Great Britain itself had
the submarine attack mastered the Royal Navy and left
our forty millions only the choice between unconditional
surrender and certain starvation. Half the severity meted
out by the Treaty of Versailles would have involved not
only the financial ruin of our ancient, slowly built-up world
organization but a swift contraction of the British population
by at least ten million souls and the condemnation of the
rest to universal and hopeless poverty. The stakes of this
hideous war were beyond all human measure, and for
Britain and her people they were not less than final extinc-
tion, When we consider the fate of the Austro-Hungarian
Empire, of Austria itself, and of the overcrowded city

What

Britain

Risked.

2i6 the world crisis : the aftermath

The Case of
France.

of Vienna, we may measure in miniature the risks we were
forced to run.

In these blunt paragraphs there is an appeal to the intellect
of Germany.

*****

How stood the case of France ?

The disproportion of national power between Germany
and France was and is the main problem of the Peace.
A stationary population of forty millions imder-inhabit-
ing the fairest portion of the globe, in contact along
hundreds of miles of land frontier with a multiplying,
progressing German race and State of sixty or seventy
millions, is a proposition inherent with explosive quality.
It is well always to talk about peace and to strive
and suffer for peace ; but it is better at the same time to
understand the causes which lead to wars. How is a forty
million France to be defended from invasion and destruction
in the next generation against a sixty, seventy, eighty
minion Germany? There was the root problem of the
Peace Conference. We need not dive into elaborate statis-
tics. It should be suflScient to state that after 1940 Ger-
many win have about twice as many men of military age
as France. How was France to find security against that ?
France was victorious. Germany was utterly defeated. But
every inteUigent Frenchman and German knew that though
these conditions might rule for twenty or thirty years,
they embodied no finality. It would have been impossible
for France to fight Germany without the aid of Russia; but
Russia had gone. No one could say whether, when, or in
what mood Russia would reappear. It seemed at least as
likely as not in the days of the Peace Conference that the
resurgence of Russia would find her on the German side.
England had the Channel, and the United States the Ocean
between them and these issues. ' There is nothing in the
long run,’ said the French, ‘ to stand between us and
Invasion, but the bayonets and breasts of our soldiers.’

Here was the fear and the peril. It broods over Europe
to-day. Even as I write, we see the French devoting fifty
millions of their thriftily accumulated money to building a
line of concrete and steel defences to preserve their country

THE PEACE TREATIES 217

against a renewal of what happened in August 1870 and in
August 1914. Here was the root issue of the Peace Con-
ference : the fear of France that she would be destroyed by
Germany and her evident determination not to be guilty
of imprudence in a matter of life and death.

But, it was said, the growing moral sense of maniind will
prevent such a downfall of civilization ever happening
again. The Covenant of the League of Nations guarantees
to each member State the independence and integrity of
its territory. To which the French replied, ‘ Did treaties
protect Belgium ? ’ But, it was urged, the world has
learned its lesson ; the Germans have learned their lesson.
No one is going to fight any more. To which the French
said, ‘ We have already had enough.’ Finally it was asserted
that men had become wiser, nobler, more humane in con-
sequence of four years of butchery and impoverishment ;
that one had only to look around to see how much
better all were than their fathers. Trust to Democracy,
Trust to the mass mind. Trust to Parliamentary institu-
tions. Trust to the sting of old wounds. But the French
continued mournfully to reiterate, ‘We want Security.’
On this the United States, being perfectly safe, and England,
being fairly safe, remarked philosophically, ‘ There is no
such thing as absolute security.’ And the French said,

‘ In that case we will have the best we can get.’

Marshal Foch, with the laurels of unfading splendour on
his brow and recent experiences being present in all minds,
declared, ‘ We must have the left bank of the Rhine. There
is no English or American help which could be strong
enough and which could arrive in sufficient time to prevent
disaster in the plains of the north ; preserve France from
defeat ; or, if she wants to spare her Armies from this, to
free her from the necessity of drawing them back behind
the Somme or the Seine or the Loire in order to await help
from her Allies. The Rhine remains therefore to-day the
barrier which is indispensable to the safety of Western
Europe and thereby the safety of civilization.’

Then the English and the Americans said, ' But the
Germans live on both sides of the Rhine, and how can you
rule over them ? ’ So Marshal Foch went back to Napoleon

The French
Demand for
Security.

3i8 the world crisis : the aftermath

Tiie Rhine and his Confederation of the Rhine. ' It would be the

Frontier. duty,’ he Said (March 31), ‘ to settle the political condition

of the left bank of the Rhine and to endow this district
with a conception that would be compatible with the free-
dom of nations. As a matter of fact these countries have
never been an3d:hing but independent states or odd parts
of states of Central Germany.’ The discussion was tense.
Mr. Lloyd George asked two questions : ‘ If the Germans
knew that Great Britain and the United States of America
were bound to support France, do you think they would
nevertheless attack ? ’ Marshal Foch answered that if
they were assured that there was no danger from Russia,
they would not hesitate to do so. Again, ‘ If the German
Army had been reduced to the same size as the British
Army, would they attack ? ’ Foch replied that they
would, because in fact the German Army would not be
reduced. He also said that the existence of a Channel
Tunnel would not make much difference.

At the same time it was apparent that the population
who dwelt by the Rhine would far rather belong to defeated
Germany than to victorious France. Neither did they
wish to be made into a buffer state. So that at the very
outset the Conference was at a complete deadlock.

Both President Wilson and Lloyd George were deeply
conscious of the dangers and fears of France. Wilson had
hoped that the League of Nations would give France with
all other nations security against invasion. But the French,
while quite willing to have the League’s protection for what
it was worth, sincerely disbelieved in its power. When the
sanction of armed force was withdrawn from the draft of
the covenant and financial and economic boycott of the
aggressor alone remained, French scepticism could hardly
be challenged. President Wilson’s visit to the United.
States and the reservations whidi he had felt himself forced
by American public opinion to make, stni further weakened
the resources of the League. Thenceforward it became
clear that if France was to be induced to withdraw from the
Rhine, some other additional assurance of safety must be
found for her. Mr. Lloyd George had for some time fore-
seen that this was inevitable. He was even more con-

THE PEACE TREATIES

219

vinced than Wilson of the dangers of subjecting German
populations to alien rule. Both he and Wilson refused to
contemplate confining Germany behind the Rhine; both
felt increasingly the obligation to find alternative securities.

The first and most obvious precaution was the disarma-
ment of Germany. Marshal Foch and the French military
men were curiously apathetic on this point. In the armistice
terms the Marshal had not included any provision for the
demobilization of the German army nor for its disarmament
except the surrender of a large number of guns. It has been
stated on his behalf that he did not believe that any general
disarmament could be enforced for a prolonged period, and
that he did not wish to put his name to terms the execution
of which he could not guarantee. He profoundly distrusted
all German assurances, and beheved that whatever promises
were made, Germany would as soon as she recovered her
fireedom of action in some way or other create and arm
new military forces.

Under the vigorous impulsion of the Prime Minister the
British delegates on the Disarmament Commission pressed
for the most drastic measures. Mr. Lloyd George insisted
that the German army should not be stronger than the
British ; that it should not be raised by compulsion and
should not be maintained upon a short service basis. It was to
be a volunteer, professional army, each soldier serving on a
minimum engagement of twelve years. Thus it would not
have the power of developing a mass of trained reserves.
The total strength of those serving with the colours was not
to exceed 200,000 men. Similar proposals were made for
the German Navy. The Frendi yielded themselves with
some hesitation to this strong initiative. The scheme was
entirely contrary to all continental ideas. It seemed to
impugn the principle of ‘ a nation in arms ’ which was the
inheritance of the Revolution and the supreme guarantee
of the life and liberties of the French Republic. Neverthe-
less, they saw its merits so far as Germany was concerned.
They stipulated that if the German Army was to be thus
highly professional, it should not exceed 100,000 men. To
this Mr. Lloyd George raised no objection.

The mihtary terms finally agreed to are astonishing. A

The Dis-
armament
of Germany.

220 THE WORLD CRISIS : the aftermath

The De-
militarized
Zone.

nation of sixty millions, hitherto the first military power
in the world, was forbidden for all time to have an army
of more than 100,000, The whole basis of the former
military organization by which the German nation had been
built up was swept away. The General Staff which had so
powerfully swayed the policy of the German State was
abolished. Rifles, machine guns, and field artillery were
strictly limited ; and the making of armoured cars, tanks
or poison gases was prohibited. No military aeroplanes or
airships were to be made or kept, and the manufacture of
arms, munitions and war material was limited to a small
number of named factories. The work of destroying the
surplus munitions was pressed forward with singular energy
by the Prime Minister. I received at the War Office his
repeated directions to enforce and accelerate it. In all
40,000 cannon were blown to pieces and aU other military
materials destroyed in like proportion. Thus mainly by
British exertions Germany was almost completely disarmed ;
and the whole military caste, that vast vested interest and
also type of national virtue which had been the permanent
agency of German might must fade in the passage of a
generation out of German life. The streams of youth and
patriotism, of valour and ability which flow perennially
from the German race would henceforward follow new
channels, and as in England or the United States find other
forms of national or social service. This was and is a fact
of prime importance.

But the French still remained incredulous and inconsol-
able. How long would all this last ? What would happen
twenty or thirty or forty years on ? No one expected a
renewal of war in the lifetime of the generation that had
known its horror and its squalors. These disarmament
provisions would be effective in the years when there was
no danger ; they would cease to act at the very time when
they were needed. The left bank of the Rhine, reiterated
the French, was the only enduring defence.

The second measure of reassurance proposed both by
Great Britain and the United States and, welcomed by
France was the demilitarization of a broad zone between
France and Germany. The Treaty accordingly prescribed

THE PEACE TREATIES

221

that all fortified works and fortresses situated in German The joiat
territory west of a line traced 50 kilometres east of the
Rhine should be disarmed and dismantled. All new for-
tifications within this zone were forbidden. Inhabitants
of this zone would not be permitted to bear arms or receive
any mili tary training or be incorporated in any military
organization, voluntary or compulsory ; and no depots,
establishments, railways or works of any kind adapted to
military purposes would be permitted to exist within the area.

The permanent enforcement of these conditions would be
supervised by such means and by such organs as the Allied
and Associated Powers might decide to employ or to create.

The British members of the Drafting Committee were
impressed with the diB&culty of thus disarming Germany
while leaving, for instance, Poland free to develop her forces
to any extent and while Russia remained entirely outside
the scope alike of the Peace Conference and the League of
Nations. It was therefore suggested it seems by the British
delegation that a preamble should be inserted to these
chapters of the Treaty by which the permanent disarmament
of Germany was connected with a general process of disarma-
ment throughout the world. This was fathered by President
Wilson, and readily adopted. It is from this preamble that
the prolonged and, as they have proved, disturbing labours
of the Disarmament Commission at Geneva have originated.

The French continued to argue that admirable as these
safeguards might be in theory, real as they might be in
tranquil periods, they would break md fail in the generation
for whose protection they were needed. One final security
was therefore sought, and the idea of a British and
American guarantee to France against a future German
invasion rose and gradually became definite. This was of
course, as far as human arrangements extend, an absolute
safeguard. It was inconceivable that any German Govern-
ment would invade France if such an act involved war with
both the British Empire and the United States. The
strength of the English-speaking world in combination was
irresistible, and the experience of the war had proved that
that strength could certainly be applied in Europe, or
indeed elsewhere, in a military, naval, or economic form to

222 THE WORLD CRISIS : the aftermath

Sequel, any extent necessary — ^though only after an uncertain
interval of time.

Foch, however, continued irreconcilable ; and the
choice before Clemenceau was poignant. How could the
dwindling, or at best stationary manhood, of France, bled
white by the war, hold the Rhine by military force alone,
in defiance not only of Germany, but of the English-speaking
world? How could he reject the all-sufficing guarantee
which the two over-seas giants so freely offered? On the
other hand, he knew that the abandonment of the Rhine
would never be forgiven by the strongest elements in
France. Not even his services to France in her mortal
peril would avail him. But his courage and wisdom were
equal to the ordeal. He accepted the British and American
guarantee and the treaty was framed on the basis of the
inviolability of the German Rhinelands subject only to an
interval of military occupation, now drawing to its close.

The sequel dwells with us to-day. The British Parlia-
ment duly approved their treaty of guarantee. The Senate
of the United States repudiated the signature of President
Wilson. The joint guarantee was therefore void. The
British obligation depended upon the American acceptance
and fell simultaneously with the American refusal. Thus
France having bound herself by treaty to give up the
Rhine was deprived of her compensating security. Isolated
and, as they claim, deceived and deserted, the French
people have fallen back on their own military force, upon
technical equipment, upon African reserves, upon forti-
fications and military conventions with Poland and other
new European States. There wiU be more to be said on
the general question when we come later on to the Treaty
of Locarno : but those who deplore these developments
and critidze their evil features would do well to study their
causes as well as their effects.

* * * * *

The fierce stresses of the settlement of the German peace
terms had exhausted for the time being the energies of the
Triumvirate. It was natural that they should shrink from
immediately plungiug into the less crucial but none the less
important and even more complicated problems of the

THE PEACE TREATIES

223

Austro-Hungarian Empire and its fate. Some lassitude
was inevitable and perhaps excusable. Numerous Com-
missions had long been working upon the various aspects.
It seemed sufficient at the moment to give a general direction
to these Commissions and to the drafting Committee of
jurists to apply the principles of the treaty with Germany
in framing the treaties with the other defeated States.

But the principle of Self-determination which had pre-
served Germany as the greatest united branch of the
Emropean family was finally fatal to the Empire of the
Hapsburgs. Moreover, in this vast scene the -decisive
events had already taken place. The Austro-Hungarian
Empire had in fact shivered into fragments in the last fort-
3iight of the war. On October 28, 1918, Czechoslovakia
had proclaimed itself and had been recognized by the
Allied and Associated Powers as an independent sovereign
state. Strong m the memories of the Czechoslovak army
corps and in the influence upon the Allies of Masaryk
and Benes, the Czechoslovaks successfully presented
themselves at the Peace Conference, not as part of
an enemy empire defeated by the Allies, but as a new
state technically at war with Germany and Austria and
awaiting peace settlements with both these countries.
A similar metamorphosis had accompanied the creation
on December i, 1918, of Jugo-Slavia, formed from the
union of the victorious Serbians and the defeated Croats
and Slovenes into a Southern Slav Eiingdom of approxi-
mately 13,000,000 souls. This new State was also promptly
recognized by Great Britain, France and the United States.
Italy, however, demurred. The Croats, they complained,
were enemies who had fought hard and well against Italy
throughout the war. Whatever might be said of Bohemia
and the Czechoslovaks, the Croats had no right to change
sides in the moment of defeat and by a judicious dive emerge
among the victors. However the force of events prevailed.
The Croats sought, and the Serbians accorded shelter and
status as a friendly people forced into war against their
will by a defunct and guilty Imperialism. Their claims
were recognized by Italy in April 1919.

Hungary had also seceded from the Empire and pro-

The Fate of

Austria-

Hungary.

The

Innocent
and the
Guilty.

224 THE WORLD CRISIS: the aftermath

claimed herself an independent monarchy. Austria isolated
with the ancient and cultured capital of Vienna in her
midst endeavoured to tread a similar path. The Austrians
proclaimed a Republic, declared that they were a new State
which had never been at war "with the Allies and pleaded
that its people ought not to be penalized for the misdeeds
of a vanished regime.

These transformations confronted the re-united Council
of Four wdth novel problems. The representatives of
Czechoslovakia and Jugo-Slavia were ensconced as friends
and in part as allies within the charmed circle of victory.
The Austrians and the Hungarians who had fought at
their side on the same fronts and in the same armies sat
outside under the shadow of defeat and the stigma of
war-guilt. Although the ruling class in Austria and Hun-
gary bore an exceptional responsibility, it was absurd to
regard the mass of the populations of any of these four States
as peculiarly innocent or culpable. AH had been drawn
by the same currents irresistibly into the vortex. Yet one
half were to be cherished and the other half to be smitten.

Two soldiers have served side by side, sharing in a
common cause the perils and hardships of the war. The
war is ended and they return home to their respective
villages. But a frontier line has been drawn between them.
One is a guilty wretch lucky to escape with life the
conquerors’ vengeance. The other appears to be one of
the conquerors himself. Alas for these puppets of Fate I
It is always unlucky to be bom in the central regions
of any continent.

It was to this strange and tumultuous scene that the
Peace Conference endeavoured to apply the principle of
Self-determination which had governed the German Treaty,
and thus redraw the map of Central Europe. The word
‘ Czechoslovakia ' was new to British ears ; but the ancient
kingdom of Bohemia and Moravia, where the Czechs
lived, stirred popular memories of King Wenceslas on
the Feast of Stephen, of blind King John of Bohemia
at the Battle of Cr^cy, of the Prince of Wales's Feathers
with its German motto ' Ich Dien,' and perhaps of John
Huss of Prague. Here were time-honoured tales. For

THE PEACE TREATIES

225

several himdred years we had lost sight of Bohemia. The Czedio-
personal union of the Crowns of Atistria and Bohemia,
effected in the sixteenth century, had made the head of
the Hapsburgs Austrian Emperor and Bang of Bohemia,

The torment of the Thirty Years War scarred for ever the
history of the two countries. Bohemia, persecuted for
Protestantism, became partly Catholicized under duress.

From 1618, after the total defeat of the Bohemians in the
Battle of the White Mountain, the Hapsbuxgs ruled a con-
quered kingdom with autocratic power. The Bohemian
people were never reconciled. Their national sentiment
slumbered during the eighteenth century ; but memories
were long and tradition powerful. The latter half of the
nineteenth century saw the rebirth of Bohemian nationalism
embodied in the Czech movement. Popular education
revived here as elsewhere a long-forgotten national language.

The schools became the centres of strife between the
Czech population and the Imperial Government. Lingual
self-consciousness and national aspirations rose together.

The Emperor Francis Joseph had been crowned King of
Hungary at Budapest ; but the Czech desire that he should
come to Prague and be crowned King of Bohemia was
obstinately and, as it now seems, insensately, refused.

During the war the Czech movement developed into
the demand for autonomy and thence into independence.

The Czechs had been accustomed to look to Russia for
sjmipathy. After the Russian Revolution they turned
under the guidance of Masaryk to the United States and
to the Western Powers. Their independence had been
already recognized. It remained to define their frontiers.

But here were stubborn complications. Bohemia and
Moravia contained at least three millions of German-
speaking population, often concentrated, usually in the
ascendant, a strong, competent stock holding firmly together
like the Ulstermen in Ireland, To exclude the German-
speaking population was deeply and perhaps fatally to
weaken the new State ; to include them was to affront the
principle of Self-determination. The Peace Conference in
this dilemma decided to adhere to the ancient frontiers of
Bohemia, well defined by mountain ranges, and consecrated

p

226 THE WORLD CRISIS : the aftermath

jugo-siavia. by five hundred years of tradition. Apart from some
vexatious but petty alterations on the frontier towards
Austria, this decision became effective.

The Czechs of Bohemia had joined hands with the Slovaks.
This tribe dwelt upon the southern slopes of the mountains
on the north of Hungary, and stretched some distance
into the Danubian plain. The Slovaks had for centuries
been imder a Magyar rule which they regarded as oppressive.
They were a Slav people akin to the Czechs. They spoke
a dialect of the same language. They wished to escape
from Hungary and join the new State. President Wilson
towards the close of the war had agreed with Professor
Masaryk that the United States would support the inclusion
of the Slovaks in the new Bohemia ; and on this Czecho-
slovakia had, as we have seen, proclaimed itself a sovereign
State. The drawing of the frontier between the Slovaks
and the Magyars was in any case a task of dif&culty. No
line could have been drawn to which there were not valid
objections. The natural bias of the Commission was in
favoxir of the Slovaks, and in the result about a million
Magyars found themselves included against their wUl within
the limits of Czechoslovakia.

The Kingdom of Jugo-Slavia had formed itself by the
union of the old Kingdom of Serbia, augmented by the
Provinces of Bosnia and Herzegovina, with the Croats
and Slovenes. The Croats had for centuries been mder
the Hungarian crown. They were not down-trodden like
the Slovaks, but a home rule movement was in progress
among them by constitutional and legal methods before
the war. The Dalmatians and the Slovenes, who inhabited
the moxmtainous country north and north-west of Venice
and Trieste, were subject to the Austrian crown. Both
these populations sought a new allegiance ; and the new
Serb-Croat-Slovene Kingdom, denoted by the initials S.H.S.,
entered upon the troubles of existence.

Again the limits of the new State had to be determined.
The frontiers of Jugo-Slavia with Hungary presented little
difficulty ; with Austria they were more difficult, and at
least one plebiscite was required to mitigate the sharpness
of decisions. The frontiers with Italy were the most

THE PEACE TREATIES

227

difficult of all; and here victorious Allied Governments Roumania
faced each other in armed menace. The Italian frontiers
of Jugo-Slavia were eventually settled by separate negotia-
tions between the two countries,

Roumania, like Serbia, was to gain a great accession of
population and territory. The crescent moon of the
Roumanian map waxed to full by the incorporation of
Transylvania. The problem of Transylvania was insoluble
by the principle of Self-determination. It presented the
feature of a considerable Hungarian population isolated
within a Roumanian border belt. The peoples of the
Roumanian zone wished to join Roumania ; those of the
Magyar nucleus to adhere to their kinsmen in Hungary.

Either decision would have confficted with Self-determina-
tion. The issues of principle being thus physically excluded
and the integrity of Transylvania being an important
factor, the Peace Conference transferred the whole country
to Roumania and thus alienated at least another million
Magyars from Hungary.

The new limi ts of Hungary and Austria were the result
of these events. Hungary lost Slovakia to Bohemia,

Croatia to Serbia, Transylvania to Roumania. She was
also required to cede to Austria a considerable German-
speaking area near Vienna which was essential to the
food supplies of that forlorn capital. It happened
unluckily for the Magyars that they had lost com-
mand of their own government in the critical period,
of the Paris Conference. A Communist revolution had
erupted in Budapest. Bela Kun, a disciple of Lenin
and a paid tool of Moscow, had seized power and had used
it with cruel violence and tyranny. The Supreme Council
cotdd only expostulate. It therefore expostulated. But
the Roumanian army was in Transylvania. Attacked by
Conununist rabble this army advanced as invaders of
Hungary and were at first welcomed in the guise of deliverers
by the Hungarian population whom they mercilessly pil-
laged. The Hungarian people were therefore at their
weakest when the crucial issues of their future were to
be decided. Not only were the various subject races, which
Hungary had in the course of centuries incorporated.

228 THE WORLD CRISIS : the aftermath

Austria.

liberated from her sway, but more than two and a half
million Magyars, a fourth of the entire population, dwell
to-day under foreign rule.

Austria is the final remnant. With Hungary she bore the
whole blame and burden of the once mighty Hapsburg
Empire. Reduced to a community of six millions around
Vieima and in the Alpine lands, with the Imperial capital
of two millions in its midst, the state of Austria was pitiful
indeed. The frontier had still to be drawn between Austria
and Italy. The secret Treaty of London had promised
Italy the line of the Alps. But in the South Tyrol, the
land of Hofer, four hundred thousand German-speaking
people of the upper valley of the Adige lived south of the
Alps. Italy claimed her Treaty rights, and England and
France were bound. President Wilson was free, and his
problem was painful. On the one hand stood the principle
of Self-determination ; on the other, the Alps, the Treaties
and the strategic security of Italy. In April President
Wilson withdrew the opposition he had hitherto maintained,
and the Southern Tyrol passed to Italian sovereignty.

It should be added that in all the treaties constituting
the frontiers of the new States precise and elaborate pro-
visions were inserted and accepted providing for the pro-
tection of minorities, their good treatment and equal rights
before the law. Italy as one of the victorious Great Powers
was not called upon to assume a treaty obligation for the
protection of minorities. She instead voluntarily declared
her solemn resolve to accord them the consideration and
fair play which were their due. The inhabitants of the
South Tyrol may therefore base themselves directly and in
a peculiarly personal sense upon the faith and honour of
the Italian nation.

In her miserable plight Austria turned to Germany. A
union with the great Teutonic mass would give to Austria
a vitality and means of existence from which she was cut
off by a circle of resentful neighbours. The new Austrian
Government appealing at once to the right of Self-
determination and of nationality, claimed to become
a part of the German Republic. Theoretically upon
Wilsonian principles this demand — ^the Anschluss, as it

THE PEACE TREATIES 229

is called — ^was difficult to resist. In practice it was loaded
with danger. It would have meant making the new
Germany larger in territory and population than the old
Germany which had already proved strong enough to fight
the world for fomr years. It would have brought the
frontiers of the German realm to the summits of the Alps
and made a complete barrier between Eastern and Western
Europe. The future of Switzerland and the permanent
existence of Czechoslovakia alike appeared to be affected.
A clause was therefore inserted both in the German and
Austrian Treaties forbidding such a union except with
the rmanimous consent, presumably unattainable, of the
Council of the League of Nations.

The exclusion of this alternative for the gravest reasons
of European peace made it the more necessary to improve
the conditions in the new Austria. This required a speedy
recognition of the Republic, and the greatest care to lighten
the financial burden imposed upon it. Notwithstanding
the urgent representations made by those Englishmen
who were actually in Vienna, the whole Austrian question
was for months completely neglected. When at last the
drafting of the Austrian Treaty began, the different Com-
missions endeavoured to apply to it the terms of the German
Treaty. This meant that the whole financial burden was
to be laid upon the small Austrian Republic, together with
Hungary. The Reparation clauses technically imposed
the onus of pa3dng reparations for the whole of the former
Austro-Hungarian Monarchy upon these two small derelict
States. This pure nonsense could of course never be
applied. But a needless and dangerous delay arose. The
complete financial collapse of Austria followed, and a
social collapse was only averted at a later stage by the
intervention of the League of Nations at the instance
chiefly of Mr. Balfour.

Bulgaria was better treated; she missed the hiatus
and inertia which followed the Treaty of Versailles. She
profited by the recoil from the decisions of the Treaty
of St. Germain. Her population was scarcely at all
reduced ; her economic and geographical needs were
studied; she was assured of commercial access to the

The

Anschluss

230

THE WORLD CRISIS : the aftermath

Bulgaria. Aegean. Yet the griefs of the Allies against the Bul-
garians were not light. The cold-blooded entry of Bul-
garia into the war; the historic ingratitude which this
act involved to Russian liberators and English friends ;
the stabbing of struggling Serbia in the back ; the frightful
injury inflicted thereby upon the Allied Cause ; the war
crimes committed on Serbian soil — all these made a long
and dark account. Dr. Temperley states in his History
of the Peace Conference that the Bulgarian delegation was
surprised on their arrival at Paris by the fact that no one
wished to shake hands with them, and a pregnant foot-
note sets forth many gruesome explanations of this coolness.
Yet the Bulgarian Treaty was drafted in a far more instructed
and careful mood than that which had regulated the fate of
Austria and Hungary. The experts were becoming adepts
in the work of treaty making ; the best and ablest offlcials
were acquiring control. The passions and interests of the
Great Powers were not involved ; they were indeed bene-
volently indifferent. The worst complaint of the Bul-
garians was that they were forbidden to have a conscript
army and that their people would not become professional
soldiers. For the rest they were a warrior race, industrious
and brave, apt to tiU and defend their soil or take the soil
of others. They sat on the ground-floor of life’s edifice,
with no great risk of falling further. It was accepted they
had been driven into war by King Ferdinand, and with
his departure into luxurious exile the wrath of the Allies
had been sensibly appeased. ,

4: He 4c 3ie

It is with the general aspects of the territorial settlements
with the Central Powers, and the principles underl37ing
them, that this chapter is mainly concerned. The Peace
with Turkey and the Treaties of Sfevres and Lausanne re-
quire separate treatment. The dispute between Jugo-Slavia
and Roumania about the Banat of Temesvar ; the quarrel
between the Poles and Czechs about the Duchy of
Teschen, the problem of the Carpathian Ruthenes, and the
larger difficulty of Eastern Galicia are complications with
which this brief account cannot deal. It is obvious how
many points of friction remained to cause heart-burnings to

THE NEW MAP OF EUROPE

THE PEACE TREATIES

231

the populations affected, and anxiety to Europe. But a fair
judgment upon the whole settlement, a simple explanation
of how it arose, cannot leave the authors of the new map
of Europe under any serious reproach. To an overwhelming
extent the wishes of the various populations prevailed.
The fundamental principle which governed the victors
was honestly applied within the limits of their waning
power. No solution could have been free from hardship
and anomaly. More refined solutions in the disputed areas
could only have been obtained if Britain, France and the
United States had been prepared to provide considerable
numbers of troops for lengthy periods to secure a far more
elaborate and general adoption of plebiscites, to effect
transferences of population such as were afterwards made
in Turkey, and meanwhile to supply food- and credits to
those whose destinies would thus be held in suspense. The
exhaustion of the war forbade such toilsome interferences,
nor would the scale of the remaining grievances have
justified their hazards. The moulds into which Central
and Southern Europe- has been cast were hastily and in
parts roughly shaped, but they conformed for all practical
purposes with much exactness to the general design ; and
according to the lights of the twentieth century that design
seems true.

The General
Design.

«

CHAPTER XII

THE RUSSIAN CIVIL WAR

A Ghost
War.

A Ghost Wax — ^The Peasaxits — ^Their Stiitors — Half Policies — ^Lord
Curzon’s Criticism — ^North Russia — ^The New Brigades — ^The
Rear-guard — Evacuation — A Parting Blow — Obligations Dis-
charged— Collapse of Koltchak— Withdrawal of Aid — ^The Czechs :
The Imperial Treasure — Betrayal of Koltchak — ^His Execution
— ^Denikin’s Effort — ^Vast and Precarious Conquests — ^Poland —
Denikin’s Responsibilities — His Failure — ^Anti-Semitism — Ruin
of Denikin — ^Allied Responsibilit}’’ — ^Lack of Concert — Situation
in December 1919— The Refugees — ^The Final Horrors.

D uring the year 1919 there was fought over the
whole of Russia a strange war^ ; a war in areas
so vast that considerable armies, armies indeed of hundreds
of thousands of men, were lost — dispersed, melted, evapor-
ated ; a war in which there were no real battles, only raids
and affrays and massacres, as the result of which countries
as large as England or France changed hands to and fro ;
a war of flags on the map, of picket lines, of cavalry screens
advancing or receding by hundreds of miles without solid
cause or durable consequence ; a war with little valour
and no mercy. Whoever could advance found it easy to
continue ; whoever was forced to retire found it difiicult
to stop. On paper it looked like the Great War on the
Western and Eastern fronts. In fact it was only its ghost ;
a thin, cold, insubstantial conflict in the Realms of Dis.
Koltchak first and then Denikin advanced in what were
called ofiensives over enormous territories. As they
advanced they spread their lines ever wider and ever
thinner. It seemed that they would go on till they had
scarcely one man to the mile. When the moment came
the Bolsheviks lying in the centre, equally feeble but at
any rate tending willy-nilly constantly towards compression

^ See map to feice page 274.

232

THE RUSSIAN CIVIL WAR 233

gave a prick or a punch at this point or that. Thereupon
the haUoon burst and all the flags moved back and the
cities changed hands and found it convenient to change
opinions, and horrible vengeances were wrecked on helpless
people, vengeances perseveriugly paid over months of fine-
spun inquisition. Mighty natural or strategic barriers,
like the line of the Volga River or the line of the Ural
Mountains, were found to be no resting places ; no strategic
consequences followed from their loss or gain. A war of
few casualties and unnumbered executions ! The tragedy
of each Russian city, of loyal families, of countless
humble households might fill hbraries of dreary volumes.

But the population of Russia is a village population.
The peasant millions dwell in scores of thousands of villages.
There was always the land, and Nature brought forth her
fruits. What was the life of these villages in this period ?
Savinkov gave a convincing account of it when we lunched
together one day with Lloyd George. It was in some
ways the story of the Indian villages over whose heads the
waves of conquest swept and recoiled in bygone ages.
They had the land. They had murdered or chased away
its former owners. The village society had flowed over into
new and well cultivated fields. They now had these long
coveted domains for themselves. No more landlords ; no
more rent. The earth and its fullness — ^no more — ^no less.
They did not yet understand that under Communism they
would have a new landlord, the Soviet State — a landlord
who would demand a higher rent to feed his hungry cities.
A collective landlord who could not be killed but who
could and would without compimction kill them.

Meanwhile they were self-supporting. Their rude existence
could be maintained apart altogether from the outer world
or modem apparatus. From the skins of beasts they made
garments and footwear. The bees gave them honey in place
of sugar. They gave them also wax for such lights as might
be needed after sundown. There was bread ; there was
meat ; there were roots. They ate and draiik and squatted
on the land. Not for them the causes of men. Communism,
Czarism ; the World Revolution, Holy Russia ; Empire or
Proletariat, civilization or barbarism, tyranny or freedom —

The

Peasants.

Their

Suitors.

234 THE WORLD CRISIS : the aftermath

these were all the same to them in theory ; but also— whoever
won — ^much the same in fact. There they were and there
they stayed ; and with hard toil, there they gained their daily
bread. One morning arrives a Cossack patrol. ‘ Christ is
risen ; the Allies are advancing ; Russia is saved ; you are
free.’ ‘ The Soviet is no more.’ And the peasants grunted,
and duly elected their Coxmcil of Elders, and the Cossack
patrol rode off, taking with it what it might require up to the
limi t of what it could carry. On an afternoon a few weeks
later, or it may be a few da37s later, arrived a Bolshevik in
a battered motor-car with half a dozen gunmen, also saying,
‘You are free ; your chains are broken ; Christ is a fraud ;
rehgion is the opiate of democracy ; Brothers, Comrades,
rejoice for the great days that have dawned.’ And the
peasants grunted. And the Bolshevik said, ‘ Away with
this Council of Elders, exploiters of the poor, the base
tools of reaction. Elect in their place your village Soviet,
henceforward the sickle and hammer of your Proletarian
rights.’ So the peasants swept away the Cormcil of Elders
and re-elected with rude ceremony the village Soviet. But
they chose exactly the same people who had hitherto
formed the Council of Elders and the land also remained
in their possession. And presently the Bolshevik and his
gunmen got their motor-car to start and throbbed off into
the distance, or perhaps into the Cossack patrol.

Moscow held the controls of Russia ; and when the
cause of the Allies burnt itself out in victory, there were
no other controls : just diatter and slaughter on a back-
ground of Robinson Crusoe toU. The ancient capital lay at
the centre of a web of railroads radiating to every point of
the compass. And in the midst a spider ! Vain hope to
crush the spider by the advance of lines of encircling flies !
Still I suppose that twenty or thirty thousand resolute,
comprehending, well-armed Europeans could, without any
serious difficulty or loss, have made their way very swiftly
along any of the great railroads which converged on Mos-
cow ; and have brought to the hard ordeal of battle any
force that stood agednst them. But twenty or thir ty thou-
sand resolute men did not exist or could not be brought
together. D^iikin’s forces foraged over enormous areas.

THE RUSSIAN CIVIL WAR

235

Tliey boasted a superficial political sway. They Hved on
the country and by so doing soon alienated the rural popu-
lation which at first had welcomed them. Had he collected
the necessary supplies at one spot in the South for a direct
dash to Moscow, and had he seized the psychological moment
just before the Siberian armies began to fade away, he
would have had a good chance of success. Master of
Moscow and its irnequaUed railway centre with a corps
of trustworthy troops, his power and prestige might have
been unshakable. But there never was a thrust ; no
Napoleon eagle-swoop at the mysterious capital ; only
the long thin lines wending on ever thinner, weaker and
more weary. And then finally when the Bolsheviks in
the centre of the circle were sufficiently concentrated by
the mere fact of retirement, they in their turn advanced
and found in front of them — ^nothing ! — ^nothing but helpless
populations and scores of thousands of compromised
families and individuals.

The fitful and fluid operations of the Russian armies
found a counterpart in the policy, or want of policy, of
the Allies. Were they at war with Soviet Russia ? Cer-
tainly not ; but they shot Soviet Russians at sight.
They stood as invaders on Russian soil. They armed
the enemies of the Soviet Government. They block-
aded its ports, and sunk its battleships. They earnestly
desired and schemed its downfall. But war — ^shocking !
Interference — shame ! It was, they repeated, a matter of
indifference to them how Russians settled their own internal
afifairs. They were impartial — ^Bang 1 And then — at the
same time — ^parley and try to trade.

The reader might well have supposed that the decision
of the Big Five to support Koltchak, which was finally
taken in June, marked the end of doubt and vadlla-
tion. They could send no troops ; they could not spend
much money. But they could give a steady aid in sur-
plus mruntions, in moral cormtenance and in concerted
diplomacy. Had they acted together simply and sincerely
within these limitations, they might have readied a good
result. But their decisions to support Kolchak, and later
to support Denikin, represented only half a mind. The

Half

Policies.

236 THE WORLD CRISIS : the aftermath

Lord Cur-
non's criti-
cism.

other half had always been, and was throughout the summer
of 1919, xmcertain of itself, sceptical about the prospects
of the anti-Bolsheviks, ill-informed about the true nature of
the Soviet Government and the Third International, and
anxious to see whether the extremists in Moscow would
not respond to the exercise of reason and patience.

A draft memorandum of Lord Curzon’s, dated August 16,
1919, describes in severe terms the weakness and confusion
of Ally proceedings.

‘ It cannot be said that an altogether consistent policy
has been pursued. Even now the principles upon which
that policy rests in the last resort are in some respects in
dispute. Action is taken sometimes by the representatives
of the Allied and Associated Governments sitting in Paris
or by the institutions which they have set up, sometimes
by the Governments themselves. The situation is so com-
plex, and the dif&culties of arriving at a decision which is
acceptable to all are so great that, in some instances, it
would be no exaggeration to admit that there is no policy
at aU.’

‘ In these circumstances, the Great Powers when they
met — and too often it must be confessed that refuge is
taken in inaction — ^adopt an uncertain line of conduct ;
the financial burden tends to fall almost exclusively on the
shoulders of those who either have the greatest capacity
or the least unwillingness to pay ; the independent States
or groups of communities, with the fortunes of which we
have associated ourselves, do not always make the best
use of the help which they get, and are constantly clamour-
ing for more ; it remains a matter of almost weekly dis-
putation whether recognition shall or shall not be extended
to this or that community ; AUied Missions despatched
in every direction endeavour to produce something like
order out of the prevailing chaos ; advice is accepted
where it is supplemented by substantial material assistance,
elsewhere it is apt to be ignored.' . , .

‘ On the Western Russian front, Poland and the Baltic
States of Lithuania, Latvia and Esthonia are conducting
military operations against the Russian Soviet Government.
So far as the Baltic States are concerned, continuance of
th^ resistance depends largely on the amount of material
assistance which they may be able to obtain, as well as
upon the attitude whidi the Allied Governments may
decide to adopt in regard to their national aspirations.
Politically, the present situation is in the highest degree

THE RUSSIAN CIVIL WAR 237

unsatisfactory. His Majesty’s Government have recognized Lord Ciy-
the de facto authority of the Provisional Governments of
Esthonia and Latvia established at Reval and Libau
respectively, and the Allied representatives in Paris have,
in the fifth condition attached to the recognition of Admiral
Koltchak, laid down that “ if a solution of the relations
between Esthonia, Latvia, Lithuania, and the Caucasian
and Transcaspian territories and Russia is not speedily
reached by agreement, the settlement will be made in con-
sultation and co-operation with the League of Nations,
and that, until such settlement is made, the Government
of Russia agrees to recognize these territories as autonomous
and to confirm the relations which may exist between their
de facto Governments and the Allied and Associated Govern-
ments.” Yet no further steps have been taken to endeavour
to secure the co-operation of the Border States of Russia
in the policy laid down by the Allied Powers, and no com-
munications have been addressed to the representatives of
these States in Paris, in spite of their repeated requests
to be informed of the intentions of the Allied Governments.

Grave dissatisfaction has consequently resulted in Latvia,

Lithuania and Esthonia.’ . . .

‘ The lack of a clear and decisive policy has been not
less manifest in the dealings with the Border States on
the Caucasian front.’ ... ‘ Here as elsewhere, the policy

of the Allied Powers has hovered between recognition and
polite indifference.' ... ‘ All is in a flux and uncertainty,
and with the withdrawal of the only Allied forces to the
south of the Caucasus, serious disturbance, if not worse,
may be expected to ensue.’

' It would perhaps be an unjustifiable deduction from
the untoward developments that I have described, to argue
that they have been mainly due to lack either of political
vision or harmony on the part of the Allied and Associated
Powers. But it would not be unfair to attribute the set-
back in part to the fact that single Powers have, to a con-
siderable extent, dissipated on various theatres such
resources as they have been in a position to give to the
whole, instead of pursuing an organized policy whereby effort
could be concentrated and a due co-ordination established
between political, military, and financial measures.’ ....
*****

Meanwhile I had a direct and definite duty to perform.

Our first object was to withdraw from Archangel and
Murmansk without disaster and without dishonom:. This
was a military and political problem both difficult -and

North

Russia.

238 THE WORLD CRISIS : the aftermath

delicate. I gave the following account of it to the House
of Conunons^ : —

‘Before the German resistance was broken and the
Armistice signed, the winter had settled down on the north
Russian coast, and the port of Archangel was ice-bound,
or practically ice-bound, and our men were forced to spend
the whole of the winter in this bleak and gloomy spot
in circumstances which caused the greatest anxiety. It
was -evident that the Bolsheviks with whom they had
been in collision, could, if they chose, have concentrated
against this particular sector of the circle by which they
were invested, a force of indefinite size ; and our men
were utterly cut ofE from the outer world except as far as
small parties were concerned. Therefore their position
was one of much anxiety. They were men mostly of
the C3 class, but they had a fine spirit, and once they
were promised that they should be brought home before
another winter occurred, they discharged their duty with
great determination, and maintained the position against
some quite serious attacks, and others which might well
have become very serious had they been allowed to proceed,
and thus the situation has been maintained throughout this
dark period. Not only was there considerable unrest amongst
these troops throughout their imprisomnent on this coast
during the winter, but also ... in the exhaustion and
prostration of the public mind which followed the triumph
in the main struggle . . . there was the greatest difficulty
in sending out any form of relief or assistance to those
troops for several months.’

And again : —

‘ . . . Whatever may be the policy decided upon by the
Allies in Paris, our forces in Archangel and Murmansk
which . . . are inter-dependent, will have to stay there until
the summer is far advanced. Since they have got to stay,
they must be properly supported. They must be sustained
with the reinforcements necessary to their safety, which
can reach them within the limit I have described, and must
be supplied with ever3rthing they may require. It is no
use people raising prejudice against these expeditions.
Everyone knows why they were sent. They were sent as
part of our operations against Germany. . . . That reason
h^ passed away, but the troops sent in obedience to it are
siffl on these \^d northern coasts, locked in the depth of
winter, and we must neglect not hing required for their
safety and well-being. ...

1 July 29, 1919.

THE RUSSIAN CIVIL WAR

239

' Further, we have incurred heavy commitments towards The New
the people of these districts who have espoused our cause, Brigades,
and to the Russian armies, which were encouraged and
called into being largely by the AUies and largely for our
own purposes during the period of the German war. It has
been the custom in this country to pay particular attention
to matters of this kind and always to endeavour, to the very
best of our abOity, to do our duty by those who have put
their trust in us, and who have run into danger in conse-
quence of action which we have advised them to take.’

In order to secure the safe and respectable withdrawal
of the allied troops from North Russia, it was necessary
to reinforce them. All our Allies wished to quit this
melancholy scene as quickly as possible, and the British
being in command and constituting more than half of
the expedition, had in practice to bear the responsibility
and form the rear-guard. The bulk of our own troops
were entitled to be brought home and discharged under
the terms of our demobilization scheme. It was therefore
necessary to raise a special volunteer force to relieve the
tired and impatient conscripts and to wind up the affair.

On March 4 the War Cabinet decided to press the AUied
Representatives in Paris to agree to the early evacua-
tion of North Russia by the Allied troops. To prepare
for this, and to meet the dangerous situation existing at
Archangel, the War Cabinet authorized me to make any
necessary arrangements.

In pursuance of this decision I therefore raised two new
brigades each of 4,000 men, composed of volimteers from
the great armies which were demobilizing. The officers and
men came forward readily and in a few days the lists were
closed. These fine, war-hardened soldiers rapidly assumed
coherent formations. They were despatched to Archangel
as soon as the port was open. We thus had a strong,
efficient, and weU-equipped force at this most critical
point from which everyone else was making haste to flee.

These troops had no sooner arrived and relieved the worn-
out garrison than a dangerous and widespread mutiny
broke out in the friendly Russian force. This treachery
was said to be characteristic of the Russians ; but the
explanation is simple. From the moment when we had

240

THE WORLD CRISIS: the aftermath

The Rear, been compelled by parliamentary and political pressure
guard. proclaim our intention to withdraw, every friendly

Russian knew that he fought under a death sentence, and
his safest course was to make terms with his future masters
at the expense of his departing Allies. This reaction,
however unpleasant, was inherent in the wise, and indeed
inevitable, policy of evacuation.

The mutinies, except on the Onega sector which went
over bodily to the Bolsheviks, were checked and quelled by
the spirited action of a Polish battalion and a company of
British infantry ; but thenceforward the 25 to 30,000 armed
and trained local troops whom the AUies had organi2ed
could not be trusted as an aid, and must indeed be reckoned
as a peril. Fortunately, veteran volunteers had, gone out
with this very job clearly explained to them. Totally
immune from the general disintegration but comprehending
it, and technically superior in every form of warfare, they
occupied the wide, depleted front, gripped the treachery
in the rear, and easily smote down the attack in front.

We had been bitterly attacked by the Socialist and the
Liberal Oppositions, and also in some Conservative news-
papers, for sending any fresh troops to North Russia, and had
we not been deaf to these irresponsible counsels and strong
enough to take unpopular action, no fresh troops would
have been sent. But for their timely arrival, a general
landslide and disaster of a peculiarly shameful character
and on a considerable scale, would certainly have taken
place in July. Behind this tempered shield, the withdrawal
of the American, French, Italian, and British conscripts,
and the removal of masses of stores, proceeded rapidly,
■without cessation. This was the first phase of our North
Russian operations after the Armistice.

The second is at once more complicated and more dis-
putable. Again, I cannot improve upon the account I
gave to Parliament on July 29 : —

‘ In the first week of March the War Cabinet decided that
Archangel' and Murmansk should be evacuated before
another -winter set in, and they directed the War Office to
make arrangements accordingly. But they also prescribed
that whatever support, nouiidament, succour, reinforce-

THE RUSSIAN CIVIL WAR

241

ments or aid miglit be required or needed by our troops for Evacuation,
their safe extrication from this position should be used and
despatched by the War Office ; and, further, that due
regard should be had to the obligations which we had inevit-
ably contracted with every class of the population of Arch-
angel and Murmansk, and with the local Russian Army and
local Russian Government we had called into being. . . .

‘ This decision of policy was co m mu ni cated to the Rus-
sian leaders. On April 30, Admiral Koltchak was informed
that all the Allied troops would be withdrawn from North
Russia before the next winter ; but in the meantime we
hoped to make it possible for the North Russian Govern-
ment and the Russian Army to stand alone after the Allied
troops had left. It will readily be seen that if such a solu-
tion could have been reached, if this local government and
local army could have maintained itsdf or joined up with
the main anti-Bolshevik Russian Army, that would have
relieved us of the extremely anxious and painful operation
of canying away a portion of the population and troops who
were now there, and affording them asylum and refuge, and
of settling a most terrible problem for all those loy^ Rus-
sians who elected to remain on that shore. . . ,

‘ Although to us who sit here at home in England it may
seem very easy to say, “ Clear out, evacuate, cut the loss,
get the troops on board ship and come away '' — ^and to
arrive at that intellectual decision, yet on the spot, face to
face with the people among whom you have been living,
with the troops by the side of whom you have been
fighting, with the small Government which has been
created by our insistence, with all the apparatus of a
small administration with all its branches and services, —
when you get our officers and men involved like that on
the spot, it is a matter of very great and painful difficulty
to sever the ties and quit the scene. I do not disgxiise from
the House that I had most earnestly hoped and trusted
that it would be possible in the course of events for the local
North Russian Government to have a separate life and
existence after our departure ; and with the fullest assent
of the Cabinet and the Government, and acting strictly on the
advice of the General Staff, we have been ready to hold out
a left hand, as it were, along the Dvina River to Admiral
Koltchak in the hope that he would be able to arrive in this
district, and, by joining the local Russian forces, stabilize
the situation and enable our affairs there to be wound up
in a thoroughly satisfactory manner.*

There was, however, a third phase in the North Russian

Q

THE WORLD CRISIS : the aftermath

242

A Parting campaign. When eventually it became certain that the
Czech troops had no longer the will nor Admiral Koltchak
the power to form any contact with the North Russian
area, the final act of evacuation began. So grave was our
apprehension of its dfficulty and danger that we decided
to send a commander of the highest rank to conduct the
operation. On August 4 General Lord Rawlinson, the
famous Chief of the old Fourth Army, embarked for
Archangel. At his disposition were placed : Three addi-
tional infantry battalions ; one marine battalion ; one
machine-gun battalion ; two batteries of artillery ; a field
company of engineers, and five tanks. Powerful naval
forces, including monitors which could ascend the Dvina
river, lay at hand with ample shipping. The North Rus-
sian Government, seeing that our decision was irrevocable,
resolved with the assent of a substantial proportion both
of their army and their people, to continue their resistance
to the end. They received imperative orders to this effect
from Koltchak. This forlorn hope excited a strong wave
of sympathy among the British volunteers, and it was
Rawlinson's impleasant task to repress these chivalrous
instincts by a sharp reminder; that obedience was the first
of military duties.

The evacuation was to be covered by a sudden offensive
against the enemy. He was to be given a blow so
severe that before he could recover not a British
soldier, nor a loyal Russian who claimed asylum, would
remain , on shore. This operation, elaborately planned,
was carried out under General Ironside’s orders by the
volunteer brigade of Sadleir-Jackson and Russian troops.
On August 10 the Bolshevik position astride the Dvina
river was attacked. The assault was completely successful.
All the objectives were taken, and six enemy battalions
annihilated. Over 2,000 prisoners, 18 guns, and many
machine guns, were captured. The advance ended with
the occupation of the villages of Puchega and Borok,
twenty miles from our original position. One may measure
the quality of the Red Army by the fact that our losses
did not exceed 120 officers and men.

The naval flotilla advancing mth the troops mined the

NORTH RUSSIA.

244

THE WORLD CRISIS : the aftermath

Obligations river at the farthest point, thus barring it for some time
Discharged. bostUe vessels. The enemy having been temporarily
paralysed, a swift and unmolested withdrawal was made,
first to the defences at Archangel and thence to the ships.
Food and arms were left with the Russian General Miller
and his troops. Six thousand five hundred Russians, who
elected to go were removed by sea to the hberated Baltic
States and South Russia. By September 27 the evacua-
tion of Archangel was completed ; that of Murmansk followed
on October 12. The withdrawal was carried out practically
without loss, and for the moment the loyal Russian forces
were left in so favourable a position that they actually
assumed an offensive of their own.

The total pre- andpost-Armisticecasualties, killed, died,
wounded and missing, sustained by the British forces in
North Russia from the Spring of 1918 to October, 1919,
were 106 officers and 877 other ranks, including 41 officers
and 286 other ranks killed.

This successful extrication, first of the Allies and secondly
of our own troops and the Russian refugees, was only
rendered possible by treating with necessary indifference
socialist partisanship, opposition mischief making, and
newspaper clamour. To the best of their ability the
British had discharged their obligations. Safety was
provided for every Russian man, woman and child who
wished to leave. Those who remained to continue the
civil war did so of their own free will. Short of remaining
there and waging war indefinitely against the Russian Soviet,
no better solution was possible; but nevertheless the
sequel was melancholy. In a few weeks General Miller’s
resistance was extinguished ; the Soviet Government
re-established its rule on the shores of the White Sea, and
mass executions, in one case of 500 officers, quenched the
last hope of Russian life and freedom in these regions.

I can see now the pale faces and staring eyes of the
deputation of townsfolk from Archangel who visited me
at the War Office at the end of July, 1919, to beg for further
British protection, to whom I had to retiun ' a dusty
answer.’ All these poor workpeople and shopkeepers
were soon to face the firing parties. The responsibility for

THE RUSSIAN CIVIL WAR 243

their fate rests upon the mighty and resplendent nations CoUapse of
who had won the war, but left their task unfinished. Koltchak.

4 : 4 :

No sooner had the correspondence between Koltchak
and the Big Five terminated satisfactorily on June 12,

1919, than his collapse began. In the early part of June
General Gaida’s Northern Army made some shght progress
round about Glazov. But this did not disguise from our
representative. General Knox, that the situation of Kol-
tchak’s forces was very unfavourable. The Siberian Western
Army had been heavily defeated at the be ginning of May
in front of Ufa, and at the end of Jime the Northern Army
was involved in its rout. By the end of the month there-
fore the Western and Northern Armies had fallen back
over a hundred and fifty miles to Perm. At the beginning
of July the line here ran approximately as follows : East
of Perm — Kimgar — ^Krasnoufimsk — Simsk — Sterlitimak —

Orenburg. During July the retreat of the Siberian armies
continued without interruption ; by the end of the month
they had evacuated Ekaterinburg and Chelyabinsk, and
had lost the line of the Urals. At the beginning of August
the Supreme Council decided to give no further help to
Koltchak, who was evidently fast losing his grip of the
situation. General Knox said of the Siberian armies :

‘ The men are hstless and slack, and there is no sign of their
ofiScers taking them in hand. The men do not want rest, but
hard work and discipline. . . . The enemy boasts he is going
to Omsk, and at the moment I see nothing to stop him. As
it retires the army melts, the men desert to their villages
or to convey their families to safety.' The retirement of
the Siberian army continued throughout August. At the
beginning of September they still had a numerical
superiority over the Bolsheviks, but having retired since
May their morale was very bad. Nevertheless at the
beginning of September General Dietrichs struck back at
the enemy and recovered nearly a hundred miles.

The success was short-lived, and Petropavlovsk was occupied
by the Bolsheviks on October 30. The Southern Army
continued to retreat, broke up and ceased to be a factor
in the mihtary situation. There was nothing therefore

Withdrawal
of Aid.

246 THE WORLD CRISIS : the aetermath

between the Bolsheviks and Omsk, which was evacuated
on November 14. The Government moved to Irkutsk on
November 17. General Gaida attempted a cottp d’etat at
Vladivostok, which appeared for the moment to galvanize
the Irkutsk Government into life. Such public opinion
as existed in Siberia was however becoming increasingly
estranged from Koltchak ; and Bolshevik propaganda grew
daily more seductive.

While all this was in progress I had done my best in
pursuance of the decisions of the Supreme Coimcil to
guide and encourage Koltchak. On May 28 I had tele-
graphed to General Knox, telling him to use his influence
in order to get the Admiral to ' accentuate aU the broad
principles of a constituent assembly and a democratic
franchise whose decrees shall settle the future government
of Russia.’ General Knox was instructed to do his utmost
to secure compliance by Koltchak with all the conditions
prescribed by the Big Four. Knox was to avail himself
of the services of Colonel John Ward in every possible way,
for no one could express better the feelings of ' patriotic
British Labour men equally opposed to autocracy and
anarchy.’ Advice was accompanied by aid. British
ships with stores continued to arrive at Vladivostok up
tin October 1919, and during that year the total amount
supplied or carried in British vessels to the Siberian armies
amounted to nearly a hundred thousand tons of arms,
ammunition, equipment and clothing. In pursuance of the
undertaking given to Parliament and the declared policy
of the Cabinet, Colonel Ward and his Middlesex Regiment
sailed from Vladivostok for England on September 8, 1919.
They were followed by the Hampshires on November i.
Thereafter only the British Military Mission and the Rail-
way Mission represented Great Britain in Siberia.

The withdrawal of the symbols of Allied and British sup-
port, and the ceaseless retreat of his forces, consummated
the ruin of Koltchak. On December 24 a revolution took
place at Irkutsk, and on January 4 the Admiral placed
himsdf imder Czech protection.

But what had happened to the Czechs ? We have seen
them already in October 1918 'wearying somewhat in

THE RUSSIAN CIVIL WAR

247

weU-doing ’ and exasperated by White Russian mismanage-
ment. The end of the Great W^ar relaxed the bonds which
had made them so serviceable to the Allies. Henceforward
their only and most natural wish was to get back to their
homes. The Allied victory had liberated Bohemia. The
Czech troops were no longer mutineers nor traitors to the
Hapsburg Empire. They were the victorious soldiers and
pioneers of Czechoslovakia. Home, which might have
been forever barred and banned to them, now shone in the
lights of freedom and of honour. Very brightly did the
beacon gleam to their eyes across the vast snows of Russia.

Early in 1919 the Czech Army Corps began to be a
source not of help but of positive danger. The Czecho-
slovak National Council which the troops had evolved
was — ^no doubt with reason — ^actively critical of the Omsk
Government. Committees were formed in the regiments,
not unlike those which rotted the Russian armies after
the Revolution. Their discipline and their fighting value
deteriorated. In the spring they were withdrawn from
the front and put to guard sections of the railways. In
Jime it was settled that they should be repatriated as
soon as possible, and appropriate steps were taken to this
end.

On Christmas Eve Koltchak, still the nominal Director of
Siberia, was in his train at Nijni Udinsk, about 300 miles
west of Irkutsk. With him in a second train was the
Imperial Russian treasure, consisting first, of gold bricks
to the total value of 650 million roubles (sixty-five million
pounds), and secondly, about 500 million roubles’ worth
of valuables and securities, the latter greatly depreciated.
Koltchak had been deserted by nearly all his troops and
followers. But a ‘ storm battalion ’ of Czechs, animated by
unfr iendly feelings towards the Admiral, remained as the
safeguard of his life and treasure. News was received that
a Bolshevik force was advancing from the North to capture
the gold, and General Janin, a French Officer in command
of the Czechs, telegraphed to the ‘ storm battalion ' to
retreat upon Irkutsk and leave Koltchak and the gold to
their fate. On January 2, however, the Admiral was in-
formed through the Czechs that ‘ all fehelons of the Supreme

The Czechs :
The Imperial
Treasure,

248 THE WORLD CRISIS : the aftermath

Betrayal of Ruler will be escorted to a safe zone, and if for any reason

Koltohak. impossible to escort all echelons, in any case the Admiral

. . . is to be safe and escorted to the Far East.’ In these
circumstances, Koltchak, on January 4, telegraphed to
Irkutsk that he surrendered his person to the Czechs. His
private car, pasted with the flags of Japan, England, France,
America and Czechoslovakia, was attached to one of the
trains conveying the ‘ storm battalion ’ ; and behind fol-
lowed the train containing the gold. Although they passed
through a territory said to be swarming with hostile insur-
gents, neither Czechs, nor gold, nor Koltchak were molested
on their journey to Irkutsk. Here on a railway siding the
Admiral and the treasure halted.

General Janin’s first duty was the extrication of the
Czechs ; but he had also become responsible for the safety
of Koltchak. Both of these tasks could have been easily
discharged but for the gold. Everyone in the dissolving
social structure of Siberia, Reds, Social Democrats or ban-
ditti wanted to see the backs of the Czechs and would have
speeded their departure by every means. Koltchak could
have accompanied them without difficulty. But the re-
moval of the gold was a different matter. Russians of aU
colours were prepared to sink their political differences in
order to prevent such axi alarming occurrence. General
Janin on January 4 had accepted responsibility for the gold
and he wasted ten days in parleying and haggling about it.
Meanwhile the Bolshevik forces were closing in on Irkutsk
and the local Social Democrat Government flushed pinker
daily. The situation became definitely menacing. The
Red forces, spurred on by news of the gold, though poor
in quality, were reaching large numbers. Such Allied
. Commissioners as had any troops of their nationality in tow
in Siberia sent peremptory telegrams to General Janin that
they would not help him out if he tarried any longer in
Irkutsk. There is no reason to suppose that the Czechs, if
they had been so disposed, were not strong enough to force
their way out with both the Admiral and the gold. But the
atmosphere was loaded with panic and intrigue. General
Janin on January 14 opened negotiations with the local
Irkutsk Govemmept. An agreement was made that the

THE RUSSIAN CIVIL WAR

249

Czechs should be assisted to depart and that the gold and
the person of Admiral Koltchak should be left behind.

One of the Admiral’s staff, Malinovsky, says in his diary,
‘ On January 14 at 6 p.m. two Czech Officers stated that
they had just received orders from Janin to hand over
Koltchak and his staff to the local authorities. The Admiral
was always calm, neither by word nor gesture did he allow
the Czechs to feel that he was afraid of death. With blazing
eyes and a bitter smile the Admiral said “ So this is the
meaning of the guarantee given me by Janin for an unhin-
dered passage to the East. An international act of treach-
ery. I am ready for anjrthing ! ” He was then incar-
cerated with his Prime Minister, M. Pepelaiev, in the jail
at Irkutsk.'

These proceedings staggered the High Commissioners
farther East at Harbin. They were not, however, in a
strong position, in view of their recent demands to Jam'n to
retreat from Irkutsk. Their remonstrances now received
offensive replies. General Janin said that the Czechs
would have been attacked unless they had handed the
Admiral over, and that the action of the High Commis-
sioners had never been the slightest help and had alwa37S
made matters worse, and that he did not recognize their
authority. ' I consider myseU,’ he said, ' rmder obligation
solely to the Czech Government which has ordered the return
of its troops to Czechoslovakia, and to the Inter-AUied
Council in Paris which has ordered me to carry out this
evacuation.’ And he is reported to have added, with
equal insolence and truth ‘ Je r4p4te que pour Sa Majesty
Nicolas II en a fait moins de c6r6monie.’

Every allowance must be made for the difficulties of this
officer’s position, and it may well be that a more detailed
analysis woidd only reveal those difficulties more clearly.

On January 21 the Social Democrat Government of
Irkutsk, already almost vermilion, declared itself Bolshevik.
Soviet emissaries entered the town. Red guards replaced the
pink around Koltchak. On February 7, before it was light,
the Admiral and his Prime Minister were murdered in their
cells in the customary Bolshevik manner by the discharging
of automatic pistols pressed against the backs of their

His Execu-
tion.

250

THE WORLD CRISIS : the aftermath

Denikin**

Effort.

heads. There was no trial of any kind, but neither does it
appear that they were tortured.

Ibe fate of the vast mass of gold and treasure is
by no means free from mystery. Undoubtedly the bulk
fell into the hands of the Soviet Government. But it is by
no means dear that they got it all. Six months later the
Finance Minister of General Wrangel’s Government began to
make inconvenient inquiries about a million dollars in gold
reported to be deposited in a bank in San Francisco. He
did not last long enough, however, to press this very far.

It is a pity that the magnificent record of the Czecho-
slovak army corps should have been marred by the sur-
render of Koltchak. It seems that for a while these legion-
aries forsook the stage of History on which they had hitherto
acted and mingled with the ragged and demoralized Siberian
audience.

>|t :|! ]|c )|t

The military efEort of Denikin was far more serious and
sustained. In accordance with the advice of the General
Staff, the main British assistance from June onwards was
concentrated upon him. A quarter of a million rifles,
two hundred guns, thirty tanks and large masses of munitions
and equipment were sent through the Dardanelles and the
Black Sea to the port of Novorossisk ; and several hundred
British officers and non-commissioned officers, as advisers,
instructors, store-keepers and even a few aviators, furthered
the organization of his armies. Denikin had as a nucleus
the survivors of that heroic band who a year before under
Alexeiev and Kornilov had in the Russian Volunteer Army
fought for the Russian cause, while it was stiU the cause
of the Allies. He had therefore at any rate a sprinkling of
competent, resolute and faithful officers. He had already,
as we have seen, gained great successes ; and as the summer
wore on his lines advanced rapidly northward till they
stretched from the great city of Kieff in the west almost
to the Caspian Sea. In his offensive, lasting five months,
between April and October 1919, Denikin took 250,000
prisoners, 700 guns, 1,700 machine guns and 35 armoured
trains ; and at the beginning of October he reached Tula,
within 220 miles of Moscow, with forces approximately

THE RUSSIAN CIVIL WAR 251

equal to those of his opponents, namely, about 230,000 Vast a.nd
men. The general survey which I gave to the Cabinet on conquSta.
September 22, 1919, while Koltchak was stiH in the field,
stated ;

General Denikin has under the control of his troops regions
which cannot contain less than thirty millions of European
Russians, and which include the third, fourth and fifth great
cities of Russia. These regions are readily accessible to British
and French trade, which is the main need of the population
at the present time. They possess a network of railways,
which are in comparatively good working order if roUhig
stock could be obtained. The inhabitants have been
thoroughly sickened of Bolshevism, having either tried
it of their own free wiU or experienced its oppression.

There is no doubt whatever that the will of these 30,000,000
people, if it could be expressed by plebiscite, would be
overwhelmingly against being handed back again to the
Bolshevik Government of Lenin and Trotsky. Moreover,

General Denikin disposes of an army which, although
raised very largely on a voluntary basis, is rapidly growing
and at the present time certainly amounts to over 300,000
fighting men. . . . Our policy should continue to be to
keep in friendly touch with Denikin, to complete the
despatch of the munitions, to help him in his difficul-
ties with other anti-Bolshevik forces, to guide him as far
as possible with political counsel, and to prevent him
from falling into the hands of the reactionaries. Above
all, it seems most important to develop trade and credit
in the great regions which have been hberated, in order that
the people there may contrast their conditions with the
miseries prevailing in Bolshevik Russia. It is to be observed
that General Denikin has never asked for men. One
British lieutenant in the last nine months has been slightly
wounded in a tank. That is the sole British casualty of
which we have information. No further large expenditure
of money (other than the questionable value of smplus
munitions), no assistance of troops, except a very linaited
establidunent of technical personnel, are needed. Counten-
ance, counsd, commerce — ^these are the means which are
alone demanded. . . .

On his western flank. General Denikin is in contact with
the rather feeble Ukrainian forces imder Petlura. The
question at issue between Denikin and Petlura is that of
a united Russia versus an independent Ukraine. The
Roumanians, who feel that they can only take Bessarabia
from a weak and defeated Russia, will naturally support

Poland.

252 THE WORLD CRISIS : the aftermath

Petlura. The duty of the Allies should be to try to reconcile
the two conflicting points of view. Why should this be
thought impossible ? The conception of a Russia consist-
ing of a number of autonomous States, grouped together
on a federal basis into a Russian union, is one within which
all legitimate aspirations may be comprised. Such a Russian
empire would be less of a menace to the future peace of the
world than the vast centralized empire of Czarism. And
this is the moment when the critical situation of all the
Russian parties and forces should make it possible, by a
wise exercise of Allied pohcy, to give such a turn to events.
A policy of the partition or dismemberment of Russia,
although it might be for the moment successful, cannot
have permanent results and could only open up an indefinite
succession of wars, out of which in the end, under Bolshevik
or reactionary standards, a united militarist Russia would
arise. Every effort should therefore be made to guide
affairs into the channel which leads into a federalized Russia,
without prejudice either to local autonomy or the principle
of general unity.

The downfall of Bela Kun amid universal execration,
and the ease with which that downfall was accomplished,
has been a most heavy blow to the prestige of the Bolshevik
system of world-wide revolution. Its influence upon the
general situation ought not to be under-rated.

Coming farther north, on the left of the Ukrainian forces
of Petlura, is the Polish battle front. This has also contin-
uously advanced in the last four or five months, involving
the Bolsheviks in continual defeats at the hands of the Polish
army and in heavy expenditure in men and munitions. The
Polish front now stands in most places on Russian soil. The
Poles are now inclined to suggest one of two courses to the
Allies :

(а) That the Allies should finance a Polish army of

500,000 men which should advance into the heart
of Russia and capture Moscow, or

(б) That the Poles should make a peace with the

Bolsheviks.

Either of these courses at the present moment would
be injurious. The advance of the hereditary enemy of
Russia to Moscow would rouse whatever sense of nationalism
is latent in those parts of Russia under the Bolshevik
international regime. Moreover, the project is not one for
which any of the Allied Powers would be justified by their
own public opinion in furnishing funds. On the other hand,
if the Poles make a separate and precipitate peace with the
Bolsheviks, the Bolshevik army opposite the Polish front.

THE RUSSIAN CIVIL WAR

253

which is the third strongest Bokhevik army now in the field,
could swiftly be transferred to the attack of Denikin ; and
this might fundamentally jeopardize his continued existence.
For us to encourage the Poles to make such a precipitate
and isolated peace at this juncture, when ever5rthing is so
critical, would utterly stultify :

(a) The general policy of the Allies in promising support
to Admiral Koltchak, and,

(i) The special policy of Great Britain in sending great
consignments of munitions to Denikin.

We should be undoing with our left hand what we had
done with our right, and by pursuing opposite and contra-
dictory policies on different sectors of the common front,
we should have done nothing more than prolong useless
bloodshed and prevent the establishment of any form of
settled authority. It seems therefore clear that our policy
at the present moment should be to persuade the Poles
to carry on for a few months as they are doing, i.e., fighting
and defeating the Bolsheviks on their borders where and
when they can, without preparing either for a decisive
advance into the heart of Russia or for a separate peace.

In regard to the Baltic States, the policy here is similar
to that which suggests itself in regard to Poland, i.e., the
taking of no violent action for which the Allies would have
to make great sacrifices or become directly responsible,
but on the other hand the fostering of the material and
moral strength of such anti-Bolshevik forces as exist, and
the co-ordination of their action so far as possible in order
to prevent an imtimely and inopportime collapse on this
sector of the front.

But Denikin’s dangers grew with his conquests. He
became responsible for a large part of Russia without any
of the resources — amoral, political, or material — ^needed to
restore prosperity and contentment. The population, which
welcomed his troops and dreaded the Bolsheviks, were too
cowed by the terrible years through which they had passed
to make any vigorous rally in his support. The responsi-
bilities for the administrative well-being of great cities and
provinces in a time of dearth and confusion, wdth crumbling
railways and arrested commerce, fell upon a blimt, stout-
hearted milit ary man with a newly acquired taste for
political affairs, who was already overburdened wdth
the organization of his army and the conduct of the war.
The political elements which had gathered around him were

Denikin's

Responsi-

bilities.

254 the world crisis : the aftermath

Hi* Failure, weak, mixed and fiercely divided upon essentials. Some
urged Mm to display the Imperial standards and advance
in the name of the Czar. This alone would confront Bol-
shevism with insignia equally well understood on either side
by all. The majority of his advisers and principal officers
made it dear that they would not tolerate such a decision.
Others urged him to prodaim that the land should be left
to the peasants who had seized it. To whom it was repHed :
‘ Are we then no better than the Bolsheviks ? ’ But the
worst cleavage arose upon the policy towards the countries
or provinces which had broken away from Russia. Denikin
stood for the integrity of the Russian Fatherland as he
understood it. He was therefore the foe of his owm allies
in the war against the Soviets. The Baltic States, strug-
gling for life against Bolshevik force and propaganda,
could make no common cause with the Russian General
who denied their right to independence. The Poles, who
provided the largest and strongest army at war with the
Soviets, saw that they would have to defend thernsdves
against Denikin on the morrow of a joint victory. The
Ukraine was ready to fight the Bolsheviks for independence,
but were not attracted by the military government of Denikin.

At every stage these antagonisms presented bafELing
problems. It was far beyond the power of Denikin to
cope with them. But was it beyond the power of the
victorious Allies ? Could not the statesmen who had
assembled at Paris have pursued their task coherently ?
Could they not have said to Koltchak and Denikin : ‘ Not
another cartridge unless you make terms with the Border
States, recognizing their Independence or autonomy as may
be decided.’ And having applied this superior compulsion
to the Russian leaders, could they not have used their whole
influence to combine the operations of all the States at
war with Soviet Russia ? And if not, would it not have
been better at a much earlier stage to have left events
to take their course ? Surely the Inter-Allied Russian
Committee, which I had proposed at Paris in February,
was an instrument whidr it was imperative to call into
being, if the dedarations of the Big Five to Koltchak in May
were ever to be made, or to be made good. But every-

THE RUSSIAN CIVIL WAR

255

thing was partial, disjointed, half-hearted, inconsistent, and.
sometimes actually contradictory.

I used what influence I had to prevent excesses and
promote concerted action. September i8 : 'It is of the
very highest consequence that General Denikin should not
only do everything in his power to prevent massacres of
the Jews in the liberated districts, but should issue a pro-
clamation against Anti-Semitism.’ September 20 : 'It is
very important to bring about an improvement in the
relations between the Ukraines and Denikin. ... It is
necessary to avoid a situation which will oblige him to
continue to employ troops against Petlura. . . . ’ 'A
report from Moscow states that Green Guards are growing
in numbers and organizing in many parts of the country,
and that if they were not afraid of reprisals from the Whites,
they might easily be made use of against the Bolsheviks.
Is this point fuUy realized by Denikin ? . . . ’ On October
9 I telegraphed to Denikin urging him * to redouble efforts
to restrain Anti-Semitic feeling and to vindicate the honour
of the volunteer army [by such restraint].’ November 7 ;
‘ I have fostered development of a strong Russian and
Anglo-Russian group, hoping th^eby to develop trade and
credit behind Denikin’s front.’

The Russian Anti-Bolshevik effort culminated in Septem-
ber. Koltchak was stiU forming a front in Siberia, and
even made a small advance. Yudenitch, with a North-
West Russian force based on Revsd, was actually at grips
with Petrograd. Finland, fully mobilized, awaited only the
slightest encouragement from the Great Powers to march
also on that dty. A flotilla of motor-boats from the British
blockading squadron in the Baltic broke into the harbour of
Kronstadt, and by a feat of unstupassed audacity and appar-
ently on the sole initiative and authority of the Admir-
alty, sank two Russian battleships in the inner basin. The
lines of Denikin anbraced the whole of South Russia and
were moving steadily northward. An arrangement between
him and the Ukraine, combined with a steady pressure by
Poland, might weU have been decisive. But ever5d±iing
feU to pieces. Koltchak petered out. The Finns were
chilled and discouraged by the Allies and stood idle. Yuden-

Anti-Semit-

ism.

Ruin of
Denikin,

256 THE WORLD CRISIS : the aftermath

itch, unsupported, failed. Poland remained inert. Denikin
came to blows with Petlura, and his forces had just com-
pletely defeated this Ukrainian leader, when his own dis-
tended front was pierced by Bolshevik counter-attacks.
The immense circle of weak, divided, hesitating and con-
fused armies and States which lapped Soviet Russia, was
incapable of exerting a simultaneous pressure. During
November Denikin’s armies melted away, and his whole
front disappeared with the swiftness of pantomime. I
cannot describe these disasters and their cause better than
in a Memorandum which I wrote on September 15.

Large sums of money and considerable forces have been
employed by the Allies against the Bolsheviks during the
year. Britain has contributed the nominal value of nearly
TOO millions, France between 30 and 40 mUlions, the United
States have maintained, and are stiU maintaining, over
8 thousand troops in Siberia, Japan has an army of between
30 and 40 thousand strong in Eastern Siberia, which she
is now in process of reinforcing. Admiral Koltchak’s
armies, equipped mainly with British munitions, reached
in May a total of nearly 300,000 men. General Denikin's
armies aggregate at the present time about a quarter of a
million combatants. Besides these, there were the Finns,
who could place 100,000 men in the field. There were
also the Esthonians, the Letts and the Lithuanians com-
pletely maintaining their fronts from the Baltic to Poland.
Lastly, there are the powerful Polish forces, and help could
also have been obtained from Roumania and, to a lesser
extent, from Serbia and Czechoslovakia.

It is obvious from the above that the elements existed
which, used in combination, would easily have been success-
ful. They have, however, been dissipated by a total lack
of combination, and this has been due to a complete absence
of any definite or decided policy among the victorious
Allies. Some were in favour of peace and some were m
favour of war. In the result they made neither peace nor
war. If they made war on one part of the front, they
hastened to make peace on another. If they encouraged
Koltchak and Denikin and spent both money and men in
their support, they gave no encouragement to Finland, to
the Baltic States or to Poland. Every proposal to establish
a unified system of command and direction of the resistance
to the Bolsheviks has been vetoed. In June, Koltchak
was promised, on the word of the five plenipotentiaries,
continuance of their support in supplies. Since that date,

THE RUSSIAN CIVIL WAR

257

the withdrawal of all support from him has been continuous. Lack of Con-
Finland at two periods of this year was ready to march,
in conjunction with the army of Yudenitch and the Esthon-
ians, and occupy Petrograd. Not the slightest countenance
or encouragement was given her in such an enterprise.

Poland was prepared to maintain strong pressure against
the Bolsheviks : she was actually discouraged. As for the
small States, they were told that they could make peace
or not, as they liked, and that in any case they would get
no help.

All these steps were perfectly compatible with a policy
of peace or a policy of strict neutrality. They were certainly
not compatible with a policy of war, such as was actually
being carried out on other sectors of the immense cirde
around Bolshevik Russia. Meanwhile the Bolsheviks suc-
ceeded in gradually developing their armies. These armies
were far weaker than the forces potentially opposed to them ;
but, as they lay in the centre of the drde, and could, subject
to the limits of their transportation, throw their weight
from one part of its circumference to the other, they have
been able to attack in detail and in many cases to over-
whelm the forces opposed to them. Thus, while De nikin
was getting on his feet Koltchak was broken and defeated.

During the last five months Denikin’s power has been
steadily growing and great successes have been gained by
his armies, but the weight against them has steadily accumu-
lated owing to the defeat of Koltchak and the practical
cessation of any serious pressure along the whole Western
or European Front. During the last three months the
very large numbers of men which the Bolsheviks were able
to transfer from in front of Koltchak, from in front of the
Poles, and from in front of the Baltic States, and the fact
that they were able to throw practically the whole of thdr
reserves on the Southern or Denikin front, have given
thein, a large superiority of numbers over Denikin. His
army, which is still the best army, spread out in practically
a single line on a front of more than 1,200 miles, has now
been thrown back ever3nyhere by these superior forces.

Although there are still battles to be fought and the resisting
power of his army is still very considerable, he may be
overwhelmed and broken up as an effective military factor.

The declarations which have been made in public of the with-
drawal of support, the lack of any moral support or vigorous
concerted action, and the feeling of being abandoned by
the great Allied Powers may easily produce conditions in
his army which will lead to its complete destruction or
disappearance. The destruction of Koltchak’s army and

K.

258 THE WORLD CRISIS ; the aftermath

Situation in Govenmient is practically complete, and the whole vast

December region of Siberia up to Lake Baikal, east of which the
Japanese have taken effectual charge, will be submerged
either by the Bolshevik armies or sheer anarchy. Turkestan
and the provinces of Central Asia are over-run by the
Bolsheviks, who already menace Persia and are intriguing
with Af ghanis tan. Whereas concerted efforts could quite
easily have sustained Koltchak, carried Denikin to success
and enabled Petrograd to be captured by Yudenitch, with
the Esthonians and the Films, the Bolsheviks are now-
within measurable distance of complete military triumph
on all fronts where they are active.

It is with the situation arising out of these facts that
we are now confronted. The inactivity of the Poles has
enabled the Bolsheviks to concentrate against Denikin ;
the destruction of Denikin will enable them, if they choose,
to concentrate against the Poles. The growth of Denikin’s
forces and the efforts of his armies took the pressure off the
Baltic States and enabled Finland to remain inert. What
is now happening to Denikin has already produced a signifi-
cant change in the Baltic area. The Bolshevik negotiators
have entirely altered their tone towards the small States,
as they are quite justified in doing, in consequence of the
changed military situation. The alarm of the Esthonians,
the Latvians and the Lithuanians is already apparent and
will become increasingly apparent as Denikin's fortunes
and strength subside. Finland is now reported by the latest
telegrams to be mobilizing a hundred thousand men as a
defensive measure. Half that number two months ago
would have sufficed, in conjunction with Yudenitch’s effort,

. to have taken Petrograd. The collapse of Denikin will
give the Bolsheviks the command of the Caspian and place
them in dose and effective relation with the Turkish Nation-
alists under Enver and Mustapha Kemal and others. The
pressure on Persia and the danger in Afghanistan will in
that event immediately assume a most direct and formidable
diaracter.

We are told that it is idle to speculate about the future,
or to indulge in prophecy. But surely certain well-marked
and not distant contingendes which will follow upon the
destruction of Denikin do require to be thought over in
advance. Hitherto it has been a cheap thing to mock
at Denikin’s efforts and to indulge to the full the easy
wisdom of pessimism and indifference. Hitherto the Allies
have been fighting Bolshevism mainly with Russian armies.
What will happen when these Russian armies are gone ?
Zinoviev is reported in the latest wireless to have used a

THE RUSSIAN CIVIL WAR

259

most significant expression which reveals clearly the effect Situation in
upon the minds of the Bolshevik leaders of the intoxicating
draught of military success of whidi they have been made ^ ^
a present. ‘ The peace/ he is reported to have said, ‘ which
Russia must obtain would not be a Socialist peace but a
bourgeois peace.’ The demands which the Bolsheviks are
now to make on Esthonia, the menace which Finland already
recognizes, and the situation in Central Asia and towards
the frontiers of India, are the first illustrations of what is
meant by this.

Whereas by taking the proper concerted measures we
could, without any large additional emplo3unent of men or
money, have established an anti-Bolshevik and modernized
Russia friendly to the Entente, we are now withm measur-
able distance of a Bolshevik Russia thoroughly militarized,
with nothing but its militarism to live on, bitterly hostile
to the Entente, ready to work with Germany, and already
largely organized by Germany. The idea that Poland will
serve as a barrier to such dangers is illusory. The idea
that by standing on the defensive on the east until every
other anti-Bolshevik force has been destroyed, she will be
able to maintain a strong attitude towards Germany in the
west, is equally ill-formded. What is the wisdom of a policy
which seeks to strengthen Poland by allied money and
munitions cind yet calmly acquiesces in the destruction of
Denikin and the consequent liberation of the main BoMievik
armies to treble and quadruple the enemies with whom
Poland has to contend ? What is the justice or logic of
recognizing every State, and even to a large extent guaran-
teeing the independence and security of every State which
has tom itself away from the Russian Empire, while refusing
to recognize and aid in preserving the great territories and
populations in the south of Russia from which General
Denikin’s armies are drawn and which are imquestionably
anti-Bolshevik ?

It is a delusion to suppose that all this year we have been
fighting the battles of the anti-Bolshevik Russians. On
the contrary, they have been fighting ours ; and this truth
will become painfully apparent from the moment that they
are exterminated and the Boldrevik armies are supreme
over the whole vast territories of the Russian Empire.

As Denikin’s failure became pronounced, the fitful coun-
tenance which the Great Powers had given him was swiftly
withdrawn. On February 3, 1920, it became my duty to
instruct General Holman to put the facts plainly before the
Russian leader. ‘ I cannot hold out any expectation that the

The

Refugees.

260 THE WORLD CRISIS : the aftermath

British Government will give any further aid beyond what
has been already promised in the final packet. Neither will
they use their influence to make an aggressive combination
between the Poles, the Baltic States, Finland, etc., with
Denikin against Soviet Russia. Their reason is that they
do not possess the resources in men or money sufficient to
carry any such enterprise to success, and they do not wish
to encourage others without having the power to sustain
them. . . . The British Government in general agreement
with the French Government are disposed to offer to the
Border States a measure of support in case they are attacked
by the Soviet Government. ... It is no good arguing
whether this is a wise or a right policy : it is what I believe
is going to happen. It is said the Border States are only
fighting for their independence, while Denikin is fighting
for the control of Russia. We cannot undertake to make
further exertions in support of this last objective, although
we sympathize with it. . . . The question which must
now be faced is how to save as much as possible from
the wreck.'

I now pinned my hopes to finding some asylum, however
temporary, for the mass of refugees who fled southward
from Red vengeance. The Cossack territories of the Don
and the Kuban, where the whole population was passion-
^ately anti-Bolshevik, might perhaps be constituted an
independent or autonomous region. Failing this, there was
the Crimea. Into this fertile peninsula the broken frag-
ments of Denikin’s armies and several hundred thousand
civilian fugitives were soon crowded in every circumstance
of misery and want. Their defence was maintained for
a few more months after Denikin’s supersession, by General
Wrangel, a new figure of unusual energy and quality, who
thus too late reached the first place in White Russian
counsels. Some morsd assistance — ^in the form of gun-fire
— ^was given by the British fleet, officially engaged in rescue
work, in preventing the Bolsheviks from invading the Crimea
by sea. But in July the marsh defences dried up and the
land defences broke down, the Crimea was overrun, and a
hideous fUght of refugees to Constantinople ensued. There
were not enough ships for half of the panic-stricken multi-

THE RUSSIAN CIVIL WAR

261

tudes. The savage enemy tore down exultingly their last des-
pairing defenders. Smallpox and typhus epidemics made new
alliances with sword and famine. Shiploads of destitute and
infected persons — sometimes all dead or moribund — arrived
continuously in the already overcrowded, impoverished and
straitened Turkish capital. A veil has been drawn over the
horrors of this final phase. The British troops and sailors,
and some British and American philanthropic agencies in
Constantinople gave almost all they possessed in local aid ;
but the ‘ Allied and Associated Powers ’ averted their
gaze and stopped their ears. They did not wish to know
too much, and like Napoleon at the Beresina could only
reply ‘ Voulez-vous oter mon cahne ? ' After all Death is
merciful : it was certamly busy.

Such were the solutions which the victors in the Great
War were able to afiord to Russian affairs.

The Final
Horrors.

CHAPTER XIII

THE MIRACLE OF THE VISTULA

' Our next step on the path to world victory is the destruction
of Poland.’ — Trotsky.

The Lincli-pin — Poland’s Problem — Poland’s Dangers — The Bol-
shevik Concentration — ^The Polish Advance — ^The Ukraine —
The Invasion of Poland — ^The Armistice Negotiations — ^The
Deadly Terms — ^Warsaw : The Miracle — ^Decisive Results — ^A
Summing-up — ^Lost Possibilities — ^A Consolation — ^An Advan-
tage.

The Linch- ^'T^HE gates of new perils were now opened on the
JL world.

Poland was the linch-pin of the Treaty of Versailles.
This ancient State, tom into three pieces by Austria, Pmssia
and Russia, was at last liberated from its oppressors and
reunited in its integrity after 150 years of bondage and
partition. The doors of the Bastille had been broken down,
its towers and battlements had been overthrown in the
supreme convulsion, and from the ruins there emerged this
prisoner of the eighteenth century, long cut off from light
and air, limbs dislocated by the rack, with a nature as
gifted, a heart as proud, and a head as it then seemed as
impracticable as ever. Adversity had not broken the
spirit of Poland ; had it taught her wisdom ?

But justice to Poland requires a fair recognition of her
extraordinary difficulties. While she was still dazzled by
the newly found freedom, before she could brace herself
to the atmosphere of this modem age, there rudied upon
her a series of perils, perplexities and embarrassments which
might well have baffled the sagacity and experience of the
most solidly established Government. To the westward
lay quivering Germany, half stunned, half chained, but still
endowed with those tremendous faculties and qualities

262

THE MIRACLE OF THE VISTULA 263 .

which had enabled her almost single-handed to wage an
obstinate war against nearly the whole world at once.
Eastward, also prostrate, also in dire confusion, lay the
huge mass of Russia — ^not a wotmded Russia only, but a
poisoned Russia, an infected Russia, a plague-bearing
Russia ; a Russia of armed hordes not only smiting with
bayonet and with cannon, but accompanied and preceded
by swarms of t 37 phus-bearing vermin which slew the bodies
of men, and political doctrines which destroyed the health
and even the soul of nations. And between these two
agonized Empires, reacted upon continually by their dis-
tresses, stood Poland, comparatively weak, comparatively
small, quite inexperienced, without organization, without
structure, diort of food, short of weapons, short of
money, brandishing her indisputable and newly reaffirmed
title-deeds to freedom and independence. A reasonable
comprehension of Poland’s difficulties was indispensable
to a true measuring of Poland’s perils.

The intention of those who framed the Treaty of Versailles
had been to create in Poland a living, healthy, vigorous
organism which should form a serviceable barrier between
Germany and Russia and between Russian Bolshevism — ^as
long as it might last — ^and the rest of Europe. The ruin
and coUapse of Poland and its incorporation as a whole
in the Russian political group would sweep away this
barrier and would bring Russia and Germany into direct
and immediate contact. The interests of France must be
gravely and even vitally affected by the over-running of
Poland by the Bolshevik armies, or by the subversion of
the Polish State through Bolshevik propaganda and con-
spiracy. The French had largely themselves to thank for
the alarming situation with which they were now to be
confronted. They had derided the efforts of Denikin ;
they had made no attempt to establii^ good working
arrangements between the National Russians on the one
hand and Poland and the frontier States on the other.
They had in no way taken the lead, as their interests
required them to do, in promoting a definite, concerted
action between all the anti-Bolshevik forces and States.
Their lethargy had made our own half-hearted efforts

Poland's

Problem.

Poland's

Dangers.

264 THE WORLD CRISIS : the aftermath

useless. They had remained impassive and apparently
rmcomprehending spectators of Denikin’s downfall and of
the steady concentration of the Russian armies against
Poland. They had made no effort to induce Finland,
Esthonia, Latvia and Lithuania to combine in common
action against the common peril. On the contrary, they,
like the British, had encouraged these States to make peace,
not a general peace but a piecemeal peace, Poland being
left, and even urged, to remain practically isolated, but
at war.

Of this new series of dangers I gave the following account
on May 21, 1920 ;

The difficulties of Poland in dealing with a Government
like the Soviet Government of Russia should not be under-
rated. The same difficulties have been experienced by every
other country which is in direct contact with Bolshevik
Russia. In no case has anything like a satisfactory peace
been arranged by such countries with Soviet Russia. The
Bolsheviks do not work only by military operations, but,
simultaneously or alternatively with these, they employ
every device of propaganda in their neighbours’ territories
to make the soldiers mutiny against their officers, to raise
the poor against the bourgeois, to raise the workmen against
the employers, to raise the peasants against the land-
owners, to paralyse the cotmtry by general strikes, and
generally to destroy every existing form of social order
and of democratic government. Thus a state of so-called
peace, i.e., a suspension of actual fighting with firearms,
may simply mean that the war proceeds in a still more
difficult and dangerous form, viz., instead of being attacked
by soldiers on the frontier, the country is poisoned internally
and every good and democratic institution which it pos-
sesses is undermined. For a country like Poland, newly
constituted, struggling to get on its feet on being liberated
after over a century of foreign oppression, whose finances
are in disorder, and whose resources are so greatly im-
poverished by the horrors of the war, this second form of
attack is particularly dangerous.

The Bolsheviks, however, while loudly professing a desire
for peace, have, since the end of last year, been preparing
for an ofiensive on the Polish front.

In addition to a steady flow of reinforcements toward
the Polish front, there have been numerous indications of
an impending attack by the Bolsheviks. The approximate

THE MIRACLE OF THE VISTULA 265

strength of the Bolshevik armies on the Western front has
increased from 81,200 in January, 1920, to 99,200 in early
March, and to 133,600 by mid-April. These figures are
rifles and sabres, i.e. effective fighting strength. The
downfall of Denikin liberated a large number of troops.
Many statements have been made by Bolshevik leaders
to the effect that they would deal with Poland as they have
dealt with Denikin and Koltchak, and great anxiety was
felt by Poland during the winter as to what the fate of
Poland would be if exposed to such an attack.

There is no doubt that the Bolsheviks hoped that, what
with their propaganda and their reinforced front, they
would be able to beat the Polish troops and overthrow
the Government behind them, and, if so, a most difficult
situation would have arisen. The reactionary Germans
would of course be delighted to see the downfall of Poland
at the hands of the Bolsheviks, for they fully understand
that a strong Poland standing between Russia and Germany
is the one thing that will baulk their plans for [an Imperialist]
reconstruction and for revenge.

About two months ago (on March 5) the Bolshevik
offensive against the Poles began, the main weight of this
attack being between the Pripet and the Dniester, a front
of 250 miles. It then however became apparent that the
Polish Army, although ill-supplied and ill-clothed, was
nevertheless imbued with a strong patriotic spirit. The
Bolshevik attack never made any real progress, in spite of
being repeatedly renewed during the rest of the month.
The Bolsheviks then initiated discussions regarding the
opening of peace negotiations, and invited the Polish
Government to indicate the time and place for such
negotiations.

Lh.e Poles offered Borisov, a place a short distance within
their lines, and suggested April 10 as a suitable date,
at the same time expressing their readiness to order a
cessation of hostilities on that portion of the front. The
Poles also guaranteed that their Army would abstain from
offensive action during the negotiations. The Bolsheviks,
however, rejected the Polish proposals, and demanded an
armistice on the whole front, and the selection of a place
either in the interior of Poland or in a neutral or Allied
country for negotiations.

In the meanwhile, fresh Bolshevik reinforcements were
being concentrated on the Polirii front, and there was
every indication that the offensive against the Poles was
about to be renewed. The Poles therefore naturally
assumed that the Soviet Government was only procras-

The Bolshe-
vik Concen-
tration.

266 THE WORLD CRISIS : the aftermath

The Polish tinating, and was endeavouring to create a delay in which
Advaaoe. undermine the morale of the Polish troops and popu-

lation by propaganda, while preparing for the renewed
offensive.

The Polish Government, rmder Marshal Pilsudski, a former
revolutionary against the Czarist regime, of course imder-
stand very intimately the Russian political situation, and
have shown a profound knowledge of how to tranquillize
Russian territory which they are temporarily administering.
Their desire is believed to be to have some sort of buffer
between them and Bolshevik Russia, at any rate over a
portion of their front. Suda a buffer state would be con-
stituted by an independent Ukraine.

The Polish Foreign Ofi&ce, on April 27, issued a
communique to the effect that Poland acknowledged the
right of the Ukraine to independence, and recognised
Petlura's Government. Marshal Pilsudski, on the same
day, issued a declaration in which he stated that the Polish
Aimy would co-operate with Ukrainian forces, and would
only remain in Ukrainian territory long enough to enable
the Ukrainian Government to be establidied. When this
government had been establidied the Polidi troops, he
said, would withdraw.

Petlura also published a declaration on that day urging
the Ukrainian people to do all in their power to facilitate
the operations of the Polish and Ukrainian forces.

General Denikin was of course entirely opposed either
to a strong Poland or to an independent Ukraine, his idea,
to which he was always true, being a united Russia on
pre-war lines, although willing to recognise a Polish State,
the boundaries of which were to be settled by negotiations
sanctioned by the Constituent Assembly. With his dis-
appearance the Ukrainians, under Petlura, have driven the
Bolsheviks out of a large part of their territory, and are
making an effort to establish an independent Ukraine
free from Bolsheviks. Simultaneously with the Polish-
Ukrainian advance, great popular risings occurred in the
Ukraine against the Bolsheviks, and the liberating forces
were shown every sign of welcome. Incidentally one
Ukrainian-Galician division (impressed by the Bolsheviks
for service with the Red Army) laid down their arms and
refused to fight against the Pohsh-Ukrainian forces.

There could be no greater advantage to the famine areas
of Central Europe than the re-estabhshment of a peaceful
state of the Ukraine on a basis which permitted economic
and conomercial transactions to take place. It is there in
the Ukraine, and not in the stsirving regions of Russia,

THE MIRACLE OF THE VISTULA 267

reduced to destitution under Bolshevik rulej that an addition
to the food supply may be hoped for.

It is not possible to say yet what the outcome will be.
The Bolsheviks will no doubt make an effort to overwhelm
the Poles, and they will certainly get any assistance from
the reactionary Germans which can be given unofi&dally.
It will be very difficult for the Ukrainians to establish order
in their own country. But on the assumption that Petlura’s
Government manages to set up and maintain a separate
Government of a civilised type capable of liberating the
com supplies of the Ukraine, and with that territory
sheltered and assisted in this task by a strong Poland, it
ought not to be impossible to arrive at satisfactory condi-
tions of a general peace in the east in the course of the
present summer. If on the other hand Poland succumbs
to Bolshevik attacks and the Ukraine is again overrun,
the anarchy and disorder destro3dng all productive capacity
which invariably accompanies the establishment of the
Soviet regime will prevent all effective export of grain from
the Ukraine, and the downfall of Poland will directly involve
the vital interests of France, and, in a lesser degree, of
Great Britain ; it wiU, moreover, materially further the
designs for reconstruction on imperialistic lines which the
reactionary elements in Germany desire.

Again on Jime 26, after the Poles had been forced to
evacuate Kieff and when the Boldievik invasion of Poland
was clearly imminent :

‘ Are we looking ahead at all and making up our minds
what we shall do if there is a complete Polish collapse and
if Poland is over-run by the Bolshevik armies or its govern-
ment overturned by an internal Bolshevik uprising ? Would
it be the policy of the British Government to remain im-
passive in the face of such an event, which may be conceiv-
ably near ? If so, what would be the policy of the French
Government ? In the event of the collapse of Poland, what
reaction would this situation entail upon the German
position ? It would clearly not be possible to disarm
Germany if her eastern frontiers were in contact with a
Bolshevised area. . . . We ought at any rate to consider
in advance what our line of action should be.’

By June 30 the situation had become so menacing that
a Council for National Defence was formed in Poland,
with power to decide all questions concerning war or peace ;
and the Polish Prime Minister declared to the Diet that

Tte

Ukraine

268 THE WORLD CRISIS : the aftermath

Thelnvasioa the whole nation stood in peril and must realize its respon-

of Poland, sibilities. At the beginning of July the main Bolshevik
advance began on the northern section of the Polish frontier.
On the 4th they crossed the Beresina, and on the 5th took
Kovno. On the 6th the Polish Government addressed the
Supreme Council, which was then sitting at Spa, a note
appealing for assistance in Poland’s desperate plight.
Poland offered to accept a peace based upon the self-deter-
mination of the populations between Poland and Russia,
and warned the Allies of the consequences if the Polish
Army succumbed to Soviet force. On the 14th the Bol-
sheviks captured Vilna. On the 17th Chicherin refused to
admit the intervention of the British Government in his
negotiations with the Poles. On the 19th it was reported
to us that ‘ There is now nothing but disorderly rabble
between Warsaw and the Bolsheviks, and if they continue
their advances at the present rate, they will be in front of
Warsaw in ten days' time.’ Oh the 23rd the Poles sued
for an armistice.

These events staggered the Supreme Cormdl. The
Frendi saw in jeopardy the whole results of the Great War
in Eastern Europe. On August 4 Mr. Lloyd George
warned Kamenev and Krassin that ‘if the Soviet armies
advanced further into Poland, a rupture with the AUies
would be inevitable.’

On that famous anniversary, as we sat in the Cabinet
room upon this serious communication, my mind’s eye
roamed back over the six years of carnage and horror
through which we had struggled. Was there never to be
an end ? Was even the most absolute victory to afford
no basis for just and lasting peace ? Out of the unknown
there seemed to march a measureless array of toils and perils.
Again it was August 4, and this time we were impotent.
Public opinion in England and France was prostrate. AU
forms of military intervention were impossible. There
was nothing left but words and gestures.

Over a wide area the Red armies rolled forward through
Poland. Behind the receding Polish front the Communist
germ-ceUs and organizations in every town and city emerged
from their seclusion and stood ready to welcome the invaders

THE MIRACLE OF THE VISTULA 269

and prodaim a new Soviet Republic. Poland seemed to The
have escaped from her bundred and fifty years’ partition ^^otiations
among three military Empires to fall beneath the yoke of
Communisms Doom closed in upon the new liberated State.

On August 13, the Red bayonets stood before the gates
of Warsaw, and the Red propaganda rose in a surge within
the city. Where would the tides of sodal dissolution
stop ?

Feverish efiorts by the Poles and by the Allies to obtain
an armistice and a peace had meanwhile continued. These
were received by the Bolsheviks with elaborate assurances of
their willingness to negotiate coupled with repeated delays in
fixing a meeting place. Eventually Minsk was chosen. On
the loth, Kamenev handed to Mr. Lloyd George a forecast
of the Russian peace terms, which involved the reduction
of Poland to a virtually defenceless condition, but offered
her a reasonable frontier. He mentioned significantly
that there were some subsidiary clauses. The British
Labour Party had developed a violent agitation against
any British assistance being given to Poland. Under
Communist influences and guidance councils of action were
formed in many parts of Great Britain. Nowhere among
the public "was there the slightest comprehension of the
evils which would follow a Polish collapse. Under these
pressures Mr. Lloyd George was constrained to advise the
Polish Government that the Russian terms ‘ do no violence
to the ethnographical frontiers of Poland as an independent
State,’ and that if they were rejected, the British Govern-
ment could not take any action against Russia. The
French on the other hand took the opposite view, dis-
sociated themselves from the British and informed the
Polish Government that the terms were totally imacceptable.

In these circumstances the Poles continued to rally their
forces for the defence of Warsaw, and simultaneously
tried to open the armistice proceedings at Minsk ; while
the Bolsheviks advanced their forces and delayed the
parleys. -

It was not imtil August 17 that the Conference finally
assembled. The Soviet representatives, acting on instruc-
tions given them some days earlier, put forward their

270

THE WORLD CRISIS: the aftermath

The Deadly conditions. They recognized the independence of the
Terms. Polish Republic. They would not demand any indem-
nities. They agreed that the Polish frontier should be
the line hxed by Lord Curzon in his note of July ii. Nothing
could be more reasonable. But by Article IV : ‘ Poland
will demobilize her Army to 50,000 men. For the maintenance
of order a citizens’ militia of workmen will be formed. ‘ Article
VII : ‘ The manufacture of arms and war material in
Poland is prohibited.’ Article XII : ‘ Poland^ undertakes to
give land for the families of her citizens killed, wounded or
incapacitated in the war’ Thus under a fair-seeming front
of paper concessions about independence, frontiers and no
indemnities, the Soviets claimed nothing less than the means
to carry out a Bolshevik revolution in a disarmed Poland.
The scope of these designs, although hidden from simpletons,
was equally comprehensible to every anti-Communist and
Communist throughout the world. The establishment of
the citizens’ militia of workmen, combined with the grants
of land for the families of Polish citizens killed or wounded
in the war, meant a Red Guard under Communist direc-
tion to enforce a policy of land nationalization. Those
internal fires were to be lighted, from which the Polish
nation would emerge a Commimist annex of the Soviet
power.

But meanwhile there had come a transformation — sudden,
mysterious and decisive. It produced the same sort of
impression upon the mind as had the Battle of the Marne,
almost exactly six years before. Once again armies were
advancing, exulting, seemingly irresistible, carrying with
them measureless possibilities of woe and ruin. Once again
for no assignable cause they halt, they falter, become dis-
coimected, become disordered, eind begin to retreat under
a compulsion seemingly as inexorable as that which had
carried them forward. Warsaw, like Paris, is saved. The
ponderous balances have adjusted themselves to a new
decision. Poland, like France, is not to peridi but to live.
Europe, her liberties and her glory, are not to succumb to
Kaiserism or to Communism. On August 13 the battle
for Warsaw had begun at Radzimin less than 15 miles from
the city : and four days later the Bolshevik armies were

THE MIRACLE OF THE VISTULA

271

in full flight leaving 70,000 surviving prisoners in Polish
hands. The Mirade of the Vistula had repeated in a
different form the Mirade of the Marne,

What had happened ? How was it done ? Of course
there are explanations. At the head of Marshal Foch’s
‘ famiUe militaire ’ stood a soldier of subtle and commanding
i3ailitary genius veiled under an unaffected modesty. Wey-
gand had arrived in Warsaw. France had nothing to send
to the aid of Poland but this one man. He was, it seems,
enough. Through the influence and authority of Lord
D’Abemon, the British Ambassador at Berlin, who had been
sent to Warsaw at the head of the Allied missions, Weygand
was given effective military control. He re-grouped the
retreating Polish armies and changed their retirement into
a concerted counterstroke. The spirit of Poland which had
not been quenched throu^ generations of oppression blazed
into one last supreme effort for national existence. The
Bolsheviks, incapable of withstanding or overcoming any
resolute opposition, submitted immediately to a new will-
power. There was hardly any flighting. The blatant-feeble
Terror, which had marched so confidently to cany world
revolution into the West, recoiled with the utmost precipi-
tation across the PolMi frontier ; while the Polish peasants,
urged by Pilsudski in a fierce proclamation to arm them-
selves with scythes and cudgels and cleanse their land,
devoured the stragglers.

Alternatively, other accounts explain that all was part
of the deliberate plan of the Polish General Staff, sustained
by the rugged' personality of Marshal-President Pilsudski
himself. They had deliberately fallen back, like Jofffe
before the Marne, until the moment was ripe for the grand
right-about turn. They had allowed the iuvaders to extend
themselves, to overrun their supplies, to gain a false con-
fidence from a pretended weakness in the defence, and then
struck with the sureness and vigour of a Galli&n. They
now were glad that so competent a military eye as that of
General Weygand had been the witness of their successful
combinations.

The British observers thought that the result was due to
Weygand. Weygand however characteristically declared.

Warsaw :

The Miracle.

Decisive

Results.

272 THE WORLD CRISIS : the aftermath

both publicly and privately on all occasions, that it was the
Pohsh army which did the work. The reader may choose
either explanation, or both together. The more the facts
about the Marne are exposed, the more the gap between
them and their tremendous consequences is widened So
here now in this petty warfare of raw, ill-organized,
dispirited and exhausted levies a study of what happened
leaves one still asking : Why ?

But anyhow it was all over. The dangers which I had
foreseen and feared had come to pass. But their consequences
had been averted. The terrible forfeit due to drift and
indecision had been remitted at the very moment when
it was claimed. A Peace Treaty was signed on October 12
at Riga which secured the independence of Poland and her
means of self-defence against Russian invasion or subversion.
Russia fell back into Communist barbarism. Millions had
peridaed by wax and persecution, and many more in future
years were to die of famine. The frontiers of Asia and
the conditions of the Dark Ages had advanced from the
Urals to the Pripet Marshes. But there it was written ;
‘ So far and no farther.’

* « ♦ ♦ H:

It is perhaps worth while to sum up this Russian story.
Unsuccessful intervention in the affairs of another country
is generally agreed to be a mistake; and accordingly all
the efforts made by the Allies in Russia after the Revolution
and after the Armistice fall under a common condemnation.
But the Allies were bound to intervene in Russia after the
Bolshevik Revolution if the Great War was to be won.
They had no reason at the end of 1917, nor during the greater
part of 1918, to count upon a German collapse in the West.
Even in September it was prudent to expect a German
retreat to the Meuse or to the Rhine, and every nerve was
strained in preparation for a vast campaign m 1919. In
such circumstances it would have been criminal negligence
to make no effort to reconstruct an anti-German front
in the East, and so to deny the vast resources of Russia
in food and fuel to the Central Powers. Thus the Allies
became committed to the support of the national Russian
governments and forces which were struggling against the

THE MIRACLE OF THE VISTULA

273

Bolsheviks and which claimed to have maintained an tm- ^ Summing,
broken steadfastness in the original purpose of the war.

Duiing the Great War too little was done to achieve
decisive results in Russia. Any real effort by Japan or
the United States, though made with troops which could
never have reached the European battlefields, would have
made success certain in 1918. As it was, enough foreign
troops entered Russia to incur all the objections which were
patent against intervention, but not enough to break the
then gimcrack structure of the Soviet power. When we
observe the amazing exploits of the Czech Army Corps,

-it seems certain that a resolute effort by a comparatively
small number of trustworthy American or Japanese troops
would have enabled Moscow to be occupied by National
Russian and Allied forces even before the German collapse
took place. Divided counsels and cross-purposes among
the Allies, American mistrust of Japan, and the personal
opposition of President Wilson, reduced Allied intervention
in Russia during the war to exactly the point where it did
the utmost harm and gained the least advantage. In conse-
quence at the Armistice nothing was finidied and the Allies
were entangled in feeble action in many parts of Russia.

Side by side with them, dependent upon them for moral,
even more than material aid, were the loyal Russian organ-
izations. Had the Great War been prolonged into 1919,
intervention, which was gathering momentmn every week,
must have been nulitarily successful. The Armistice proved
to be the death-warrant of the Russian national cause.

As long as that cause was interwoven with a world purpose
represented by twenty-seven Allied States at war with
Germany, victory was certain. But when the Great War
suddenly ended and the victors hurried off to mind their
own affairs and exhaustion laid its hands on every Govern-
ment, the tide that would have borne the loyal Russians
onwards ebbed swiftly away and left them forlornly stranded.

Nevertheless there seemed perhaps the chance that with
their own strength these Russian National forces might yet
save themselves and their country. It was never a very
good chance. ‘ These armies of Koltchak and Denikin;’

Fodti is said to have remarked with much discernment,

s

Lost Possi-
bilities.

274 THE WORLD CRISIS : the aftermath

' cannot last long because they have no civil governments
behind them,’ It would not have been right after the
Great War was over, even had it been possible, to use
British, French or American troops in Russia. Those
that were already there must be withdrawn as soon as
possible. Intervention after the Armistice could only tahe
the form of money, supplies, munitions, technical instructors,
moral countenance and a concerted diplomacy. But even
resoiurces thus strictly limited offered a fair chance of
success provided they had been skilfully and sincerely
apphed in good time. Instead, they were frittered away
by doubtful or contradictory convictions and disjointed
inconsequent actions. The dualism of policy already
described weis fatal to success either by peaceful or warlike
plans. Either the policy of helping all the anti-Bolshevik
forces which encircled Soviet Russia should have been
straightforwardly pursued, or a peace should have been
unitedly made with the Bolsheviks on terms which assured
some hopes of life and liberty to the loyal Russians who
had been fighting with the Allies in the war, and to whom
we were in honour boimd. Neither the one nor the other was
earnestly attempted. Half-hearted efforts to make peace
were companioned by half-hearted attempts to make war.
The conflict was thus prolonged without real prospects of
peace or victory. The achievements of the National Russians,
though inadequate, exceeded what had been expected by
Allied statesmen or generals. But deprived of world-wide
moral support and separated by antagonistic national aims
from the Border States, from Poland and from Rumania,
they were one after the other broken up and destroyed,

I have explained the part I played in these events.
I had no responsibility either for the original interven-
tion or for the commitments and obligations which it
entailed. Neither did it rest with me to decide whether
intervention diould be continued after the Armistice or
brought to an end. It was my duty in a subordinate
thou^ important station to try to make good the under-
takings which had been entered into by Great Britain, and
to protect as far as possible those who had compromised
themselves in the common cause of the AUies and of

THE MIRACLE OF THE VISTULA

275

Russia herself. I am glad to think that onr coimtry
was the last to ignore its obligations or to leave ill-starred
comrades to their fate. Painful as is the story of Archangel
and Murmansk, we may claim to have wound up our affairs
there without weakness or discredit. In Siberia our part
was always small. But to Denikin we -gave substantial
assistance. We provided him with the means of arming
and equipping nearly a quarter of a million men. The
cost of this effort has been loosely stated at a hundred
millions sterling ; but this is an absurd exaggeration. The
actual expense, apart from munitions, was not a tithe as
great. The munitions themselves, though they had been
most costly to produce, were only an unmarketable surplus
of the Great War, to which no money value can be assigned.
Had they been kept in our hands till they mouldered, they
would only have involved additional charges for storage,
care and maintenance.

Although intervention failed, there remained two results
of our persistency. The first is moral. We can at any rate
say that the Russian forces who were loyal to the Allies
were not left without the means of self-defence. There were
placed in their hands weapons which, had they been a
society of hi^er quality and with greater comprehension
of their cause and of their own countrymen, might
have enabled them to conquer. Here too, the exploits
of the Czechs afford a measure of what was possible in
these times in Russia. At least it can be said that the
National Russians did not perish for want of arms.
It was not the want of material means, but of comrade-
ship, will-power and rugged steadfastness that lost the
struggle. Bravery and devotion shone in individuals,
ruthlessness was never absent; but the qualities whidi
enable scores of thousands of men to combine and to
act for a common purpose even when isolated, were not
to be found in the wreckage of the Empire of the Czars.
The Ironsides who charged at Marston Moor, the Grenadiers
who escorted Napoleon back from Elba, the Red-shirts of
Garibaldi and the Black-shirts of Mussolini, were held by
widely different moral and mental themes. But in them all
there burned a flame. There were only sparks in Russia.

A Consola.-
tion.

An Advant-
age.

276 THE WORLD CRISIS : the aftermath

But there was also a more practical result of intervention.
The Bolsheviks were absorbed during the whole of 1919
in the conflicts with Koltchak and Denikin. Their energy
was turned upon the internal struggle. A breathing space
of inestimable importance was afforded to the whole
line of newly liberated countries which stood along the
western borders of Russia. Koltchak and Denikin, and
those who followed them, are dead or scattered. Russia
has been frozen in an indefinite winter of sub-human doctrine
and superhuman tyranny. But Finland, Esthonia, Latvia,
Lithuania, and above all Poland, were able during 1919 to
establish the structure of civilized States and to organize
the strength of patriotic armies. By the end of 1920 the
‘ Sanitary Cordon ’ which protected Europe from the Bol-
shevik infection was formed by living national organisms
vigorous in themselves, hostile to the disease and immune
through experience against its ravages. In this same period
also there first began among the Socialists of France, Great
Britain and Italy those disillusionments which have steadily
developed into the strong repulsions of the present day.

^ RUSSIA

I SCAU Of MILES

WO 50 0 100 900 Ron

fiMurmanak

%^^NOBTH RUSSIAN

J 3 I

v'l

AixhangeH

Shewing positions of Anti-Bolsheuih Armies

■ °»MMwiiiiite May 20 1919 {Date of Kolchaks farthest aduanoe)

B 0 MOBB Oct 13 1919 ( . ,, Denikins ,, ,, )

^ P^N.W.AK(aY Itf, ^****<^

/ESTHONIANSitl*' A \

/ ^^skov^ \

/ TRIGA ^ X

IfETTSjr \

A \ J X

y^xiTHUANiANsX r \
VilnayX J

^ogdaV Vyatl

':■■■ i\

IjSiljni NovgoiKid

JMOSCOW

Simbirsk c

Glazov \

V O Petropavlovsk

V. \ Krasnoutimsk

Kazan

/•J

V ^ isteiMItamak ^ ®

POLES

V

/yy \

TOrel ^ 0 Tambov

I Avoronej

\

k Oronburg

y (Uralsk

*^aratov

UKRAINUNS /Wwov

6

^Kharkov

TsaritalrK

pE

\ [ffi^rakhan

^Ekawinodar

BLACK 8EA

ViadikavkazS

ConstantinopM

I^^Kr^novodsk

CHAPTER XIV

THE IRISH SPECTRE!

ehm, cioatricum et sceleris pudet
fratrumque, quid nos dura refug-
imus

aetas ? quid intactum nefasti
Uquimus ? unde manum iuven-
tus

metu deorum continuit ? quihus
pepercit aris ?

Horace, Odes I, 35.

0 wounds that scarce have ceased
to run /

O brothers' blood ! 0 iron time !
What horror have we left undone ?
Has conscience shrunk from aught
of crime ? [awe ?

What shrine has rapine held in
What altar spared ?

CONINGTON.

Self-Preservation — Changing Proportions — ^The Irish at Westminster
— Ireland at the Outbreak of War — ^The Conscription Question
— ^The Sinn Fein Members — Their Merciful Boycott — ^The Be-
ginning of Irish Disorder — ^The New Home Rule Bill — Its
Decisive Importance — ^The Black and Tans — ^The Military View
— Authorized Reprisals — ^The Prime Minister's Attitude —
Cabinet Divergencies — ^The Craig-De Valera Interview— Sir
Nevil Macready's Report — ^The King's Speech in Ulster — ^The
Response — K Grave Decision — ^The Truce — ^Prolonged Negoti-
ations — ^Within the Dail — ^The Irish Conference — Stresses in
the Unionist Party — ^Political Tension — Resignation Inadmis-
sible — ^Acid Hatreds — The Ultimatum — ^The Agreement Signed
— Lloyd George and Ireland.

I NTEGRAL communities, like living things, are dom- Seif-Preser-
inated by the instinct of self-preservation. This
principle is expressed in each generation by moral, logical,
or sentimental arguments which acquire the authority of
doctrine. Children are taught the doctrines which their
parents have found useful and which probably were useful
in their day. Therefore, the beliefs linger after their need
has passed. But though it is not always apparent at the
time, in fact at every stage we rely upon the weapons and
lessons of a bygone war. The underlying needs are always
changing at varying rates and at uneven intervals. Some
large outside shock is necessary from time to time to force
a revision of the data and a readjustment of the proportion.

^For this and succeeding Chapters see Map on page 351.

277

278 THE WORLD CRISIS : the aftermath

Changing The relations of Britain and Ireland were established

Proportions, centuries when the independence of a hostile Ireland

menaced the life of Britain. Every policy, every shift,
every oppression used by the stronger island arose from
this primordial fact. In the twentieth century it was a
fact no longer. When Britain, counting twelve millions, was
sandwiched between a France — ^for a thousand years her
hereditary foe and potential invader — of twenty millions
on the one hand, and a hostile Ireland of seven millions
on the other, the anxieties of these twelve millions may
be pardoned and the resulting measures understood. But
when France had been far outnumbered by a united
Germany, also her secular antagonist ; when Ireland
had sunk to four and a quarter millions — ^without Ulster
to three ; and when Britain, apart from her Empire, had
risen to forty-three millions ; the situation was transformed.

Meanwhile, however. Parties with their organized struc-
tures, interests, prejudices, and passions persisted on the
old basis and judged and fought as their fathers had
done before them. The shock and overturn of the world
war enforced the realization of the altered statistical scale.

Two other factors, practical and materisd in character,
were also at work. The first was financial. For many
years before the war the taxes collected from Ireland were
substantially less than the public moneys expended in Ire-
land by the Exchequer of the United Kingdom. Ireland
was in fact continuously a financial gainer from the fact
of a joint exchequer. But when, under the undreamed-
of expenses of the war and the debts piled up beyond
previous imagination, the taxes for Imperial purposes
rose out of any relation to the expenses of Irish local
administration, the flow of public money from the joint
exchequer was no longer westward to the far smaller
and poorer island.

The second new factor was not less practical. By the
Act of Union Ireland was entitled to send 103 members to
the Imperial Parliament. The astonishing changes in the
relative populations during the nineteenth century had not
affected this quota. The Irish contended that the figure
had been fixed by Treaty, and the British with continual

THE IRISH SPECTRE

279

grumblings acquiesced in the daim. There were therefore
always at the centre of Imperial Government at least eighty
Members of Parliament who boasted that they cared nothing
for Britain and her institutions ; that England’s difficulty
was Ireland’s opportunity ; that they would take all they
could extort by parliamentary pressure and would give
nothing in return; that they would throw their weight
mechanically disciplined upon the side of every subversive
movement at home and of every foreign antagonism. By
such-hke declarations the Irish Nationalist Party, at least
from Parnell to the Great War, maintained their ascendancy
over the forces of actual rebellion and assassination in
Ireland.

However, in practice, (such is the emollient influence of
parliamentary and democratic institutions) the anti-British
doctrines of the Irish Nationalist Party were sensibly modi-
fied. If they wrecked the ancient free procedure of the
House of Commons by obstruction and disorder, they never-
theless adorned and enlivened its debates. If they declared
themselves the sworn foes of British institutions, they
played a noteworthy part in the canying in good time of
many of the reforms which were essential to the growth of
British social life, and through which these very institutions
preserved their perennial vitality. When Iridi Nationalist
members denounced the jingo character of the South
African War, they were none the less thrilled by the
gallant conduct of the Iridi regiments. Irish manhood
enlisted freely, and Irish leaders comforted themselves in
their hearts by remembering that after all it was only a
small war, and that they could splash about boisterously
without endangering the safety of the whole concern.

The deluge of Armageddon swept away all these minor
defences and small ways of canying on. August 4, 19x4,
stirred the vast majority of the Iridi people to its depths
with a generous sentiment. The heart of Ireland did not
beat with the same rh3dhm as that of Britain, but the
moral and intellectual decision was the same in both islands.
The British Nation should never forget, and history will
deeply mark the surge of comradediip with the whole
British Empire and with the AUies which the news of the

The Irish
West-
minster.

a8o THE WORLD CRISIS: the aftermath

Ireland at
the Out-
break of
War.

invasion of Belgium and the British declaration of war
evoked from the mass of the Irish people. Mr. John
Redmond, with the assent and in the name of the whole
Nationalist Party, pledged Ireland to the conflict in words
of noble eloquence. The Irish Members voted the war
credits and the taxation they entailed. The quarrels of
North and South faded in the glare of the struggle, and
throughout the green island Catholics and Protestants
alike hastened to the recruiting ofl6ces.

Now was the time to strike while the iron was hot. Now
was the moment to confer upon Ireland the Constitutional
Home Rule she had so long desired. A separate but sub-
ordinate Parliament for Ulster could then have been agreed
to as a mere incident in the wide and solemn troth plighted
among all the peoples of the Empire when for the first
time they formed a common line of battle. Such an
achievement was not permitted to the Govenunent, nor
indeed can we declare it to have been practicable. Few
foresaw the long years of jeopardy that lay ahead of us all.
AU eyes were upon the battlefield. The Liberal Govern-
ment insisted upon placing the Home Rule Bill upon
the Statute Book, but a suspensory clause postponed its
application until after the war. Even this was gravely
resented by some of those statesmen who afterwards, in
circumstances incomparably more disagreeable, signed the
Irish Treaty in 1921.

In the building up of the Irish Army other important
opportunities were forgone. Irish nationalism sought —
and surely it was natural — ^to emphasize in every way
the distinctive Irish characteristics of the swiftly form-
ing battalions and brigades. Baimers, badges, uniforms,
watchwords of national significance were everywhere
in the South of Ireland objects of keen desire, and a
bolder indulgence of this wish would have fostered alike
recruiting and good wiE. Lord Kitchener saw these mani-
festations from a different angle, and no one can deny the
substance behind his misgivings. The history of 1798
stared him in the face, and, an Irishman himself, he could
fed no assurance that Irish armies raised for one purpose
might not be used for another. Beneath him the War

THE IRISH SPECTRE

28r

Ofi&ce drew its stiff routine, and much native enthusiasm The Con-
was affronted or even frozen. Old misunderstandings and g^aon.
imperfect sympathies resumed their sway as the war
ploughed heavily onward and its excitements evaporated.

The forces of hate in Ireland began to regain their control
of the national mind ; and with them the desire of youth
to dare and suffer — but for something else. There followed
the tragedy of Easter week 1916. The attempted German
assistance, the mad revolt, the swift repression, the execu-
tions, few but corroding. WeU was it said, ‘ The grass soon
grows over a battlefield but never over a scaffold.’ The
position of the Irish Parliamentary Party was fatally imder-
mined. The keys of Ireland passed into the keeping of
those to whom hatred of England was the dominant and
almost the only interest.

It was not till this melancholy pass was reached that
earnest efforts were made by the Irish national leaders,
by Sir Edward Carson and by the British Government,
then a Coalition, to reach a settlement between the two
parts of Ireland and between Ireland and Great Britain.

The Conferences failed not perhaps by so very much. All
this time the Irish divisions fought -with traditional bravery
wherever the war led them. Voluntary recruitment failed
to supply their losses. The war deepened and darkened.

With every year the contending nations raised their stakes ;
voluntary service gave place throughout Great Britain to
compulsion. Canada and New Zealand passed Conscription
Acts. The United States, coming late into the war,
sought to hurl her whole military population by rigor-
ous law into the welter. Finally, boys of eighteen and
men of forty-five and even fifty, fathers of families and
only sons of widows in Great Britain were taken for active
service. ‘ Why,’ it was sternly asked, ‘ should Ireland re-
main a favoured area full of men in their martial prime ? '

The question of Irish Conscription was handled in such
a fashion during igi8 that we had the worst of both worlds,
all the resentment against compulsion and in the end no
law and no men. The English demand for compulsory
.service in Ireland spread disaffection through the whole
Irish people. Sixty thousand Irish soldiers were serving

282 THE WORLD CRISIS : the aftermath

The Sinn
Fein Mem-
bers.

at the front, but 60,000 British troops were simultaneously
garrisoning Ireland, and on the balance our resources were
not increased.

The -victory brought no joy to Southern Ireland. The
thoughts of its people were now entirely centred upon their
own affairs. At the election of 1918 all who had supported
the cause of the Allies were swept away. The Nationalist
Party, which had represented the Irish democracy for sbcty
years, vanished overnight. In their place were elected eighty
Sinn Fein Members, entirely ignorant of and unaffected by
all those assimilating processes which under the peace-time
surface of wordy and voting hostUity had in fact produced
a great body of latent sympathy and comprehension. Here
was the old atavistic hatred, pristine and unassuaged. These
were the men of single and local purpose, intellectually at
any rate reckless of consequences to -themselves or to
larger interests. Here was the spirit of the Easter rebellion
embodied in eighty Members of the House of Commons.
There were some Parliaments in Europe before the war, there
are perhaps some to-day, which present this frightful
discordance of a minority.

The Parliament which met in January 1919 was, as has
been shown, in its composition overwhelmingly Conservative.
The pressure of eighty deadly foes might have destroyed its
debates or even have led to -violence in the Chamber itself,
but it could not have impeded or changed the Inarch of
events. But other Parliaments lay ahead. Any thought-
ful man looking to the future must count on Parliaments
in which British parties would be in equipoise and when
■the balance would be turned against the main weU-being
of the State by an implacable minority. The franchise
had been extended almost to the widest limits. The
anti-German passion which the electors had carried to
such unreasonable excess would s-wiftly fade. In its de-
cline, all those forces which work the undoing of states
and d-vilizations were revi-ving. Within four years, in
fact, a Parliament was to come into being in which
eighty Sinn Fein Members would almost have given an
absolute majority to an inchoate, half-organized and less
than half-instructed Socialist Party. For 9. long time in our

THE IRISH SPECTRE

283

Parliamentary life and Party dectioneering, there would be
gnawing at the very vitals of the Empire an untamed,
untutored, band of haters, carrying into English public life
a malignity unknown for generations— even for centuries.

Mercifully the Sinn Feiners themsdves spared us these
squalid-tragic experiences. Their own sense of what was
due to Irdand led them to scorn the execrable function
of b aff l ing and distracting the British realm. Without
hesitation and following a Magyar example, the Sinn Fein
Members renounced aH representation in the House of
Commons. Not for a moment did they weigh or value
the immense influence and leverage they could exert, for
ill or for good, upon the decisive affairs of the British
Empire. ‘ Sirm Fein,' ' Oursdves alone,' that was the
cry, and by an act of sdf-abnegation, remarkable even
when bom of hatred, they cut themsdves off for ever
from an inheritance in the House of Commons which,
though invidious, was in a worldly sense inestimable.
The two supreme services which Ireland has rendered
Britain are her accession to the Allied cause on the outbreak
of the Great War, and her withdrawal from the House of
Commons at its dose.

The reader, prepared by these general but by no means
exhaustive observations, must now be recalled to the current
of events.

On January 15, 1919, the Sum Fein Congress met in Dublin
and read a Dedaration of Independence. On the 22nd a
Republican Parliament met at the Dublin Mansion House
and dected a Cabinet. When on February 4 the new House
of Commons assembled at Westminster, scarcely any repre-
sentatives of Ireland, except from Ulster, were present. So
much was going on all over the world and our own affairs
pressed upon us so importunatdy, that the significance of
these demonstrations was hardly noticed. Bringing home
the Army ; the reconstruction of peace-time industry ; the
resumption of dvil life ; the Peace Conference ; the eventual
Treaty ; and the vast confusion of Europe, completdy
absorbed the thought and energy of the new administration.
The scale and speed of world history had to fall by diaip
and continuous gradations before the fact that Ireland still

Their Merci»
ful Boycott.

284 THE WORLD CRISIS : the aftermath

The Begin- existed rose again in Britidi minds. But as the tumxilt of

Dklrder™^ the whole world gradually and spasmodically subsided with
many reverberations. Southern Ireland was perceived to be
crying aloud in a strange voice, and the words she cried
were presently understood to be ‘ Independence or Murder.’

During the summer and autumn of 1919 occasional but
nationally-conceived murders began to be perpetrated upon
the humble agents of the British Crown in Ireland, and by
the end of the year an organized campaign of assassinations
of magistrates, of police and of soldiers when found in twos
and threes, developed progressively through the three
provinces of Southern Ireland. The policy of these outrages
was not discountenanced by the Sinn Fein Parliament, but
the actual work was done by the secret societies called the
‘ Irish Republican Army ’ and the ' Irish Republican Brother-
hood.’ The form of warfare was repulsive. A constable
on his beat in the streets of a town or village is asked
some casual question like ‘ What is the time ? ’ As he
takes out his watch to give the information, he is shot
dead. The perpetrator although seen by dozens of
persons walks off unpursued, and no one will give
evidence against him. Or again, British soldiers return-
ing from Mass are suddenly fired upon from behind a
hedge and three or four are shot down. As the year
advanced these murders grew in number and in scale.
They culminated in a determined attempt on Decem-
ber ig to murder Lord French. The Viceroy’s motor-car
was held up by gunmen and received several voUeys of
pistol shots. Lord French himself was uninjured; one
of the assailants was killed and one of the escort was
wounded. All was, however, on a fairly petty scale.
Between May and December, 1919, there were about 1,500
political offences, including 18 murders and 77 armed attacks.

Under the pressure of these events Dublin Castle
decided in August to proclaim the suppression of Sinn
Fein, and in September they banned its Parliament. In
December leading Sinn Feiners were arrested and de-
ported, and the Freeman’s Journal was prohibited. These
modest counter-measures were attended only by increas-
ing disorder. The troops and the police bore the strain

THE IRISH SPECTRE 285

of the assassinations, for which of course hardly anyone
was brought to justice, with exemplary patience for a
long time. But at length their distress and indignation
led them to take the law into their own hands. Soldiers
whose comrades had been murdered wrecked the shops
and dwellings of persons in the neighbourhood of the
crime, and the police began here and there unauthorized
reprisals upon suspected persons. Large numbers of people
in England, themselves exposed to no danger, were sincerely
shocked by such undisciplined conduct. However, it 'wiU.
always be very difficult to persuade armed bodies of men
to endure with impassive good humoru: for any long period
being hunted down and murdered one by one. Rein-
forcements were sent to Ireland and the Constabulary
were largely increased. The unauthorized reprisals grew
with the increasing provocation.

Meanwhile the British Cabinet had in September 1919
decided to introduce a Home Rule Bill. This measure was
designed to replace the famous Home Rule Act which had
received the Royal Assent but was indefinitely suspended.
The Government of Ireland Bill of 1920 was a considerable
measure. It gave real and important powers of self-
government to Irdand. It came with the authority of a
Government and a Parliament based upon an overwhelming
Conservative and Unionist majority. Life-long opponents to
Home Rule like Mr. Walter Long, who had become a Coalition
Minister, sponsored the Bill. He could do this because
separate Legislatures were proposed for North and South,
and because the matters reserved to be dealt with by the
Council of Ireland were of a non-controversial character.
Irish representation at Westminster was materially reduced.

After prolonged debates this Bill received the Royal
Assent in Decanber 1920. It was accepted under bitter
protest by the Protestant North. They bowed to the
decision of the Imperial Parliament. They used their
option to contract out of the Dublin Parliament and
set up their own legislature and Government as prescribed
by the Act. Had the powers of this measure been accepted
and exercised in a reasonable and friendly spirit by the
dominant demraits in Southern Ireland there is little doubt

ThelTew
Home Kale
BiU.

Its Decisive
Importance.

286 THE WORLD CRISIS : the aftermath

that the Irish Nationalist grievance would have been sub-
stantially met, and certainly Ireland — escaping a long and
painful ordeal — ^would to-day be more prosperous, more
influential and more united. No doubt there had been
many occasions since 1886 when such a measure, if it could
have been presented by a Conservative Government, would
have been accepted with good wiU. In 1920 it was simply
ignored by the ruling Sinn Fein organizations. They
refused to put it into operation in Southern Ireland, and
the campaign of disorder and systematized murder continued
to grow.

Nevertheless the Bill of 1920 was a decisive turning-
point in the history of the two islands.' In important
respects it was tantamount to the repeal of the Act of
Union after 120 years of friction. As such it profoundly
affected the Unionist Party, whose very name lost its mean-
ing. It had a more practical and irrevocable importance.
Ulster, or rather its six predominantly Protestant counties,
became a separate entity clothed with constitutional
form, possessing all the organs of government and adminis-
tration, including police and the capacity of self-defence
for the purposes of internal order. From that moment
the position of Ulster became unassailable. It could never
again be said that Ulster Protestants barred the aspirations
of their Southern fellow countrymen. They had indeed
on the contrary acquiesced in a large disturbance of their
own foundations and by their compliance with the decision
of the Imperial Parliament exposed themselves to poignant
reproaches from the Unionists of Southern Ireland. Every
argument of self-determination ranged itself henceforward
upon their side. Never again could any British Party
contemplate putting pressure upon them to part with the
Constitution they had reluctantly accepted. They were
masters in their own house, and small though it might be,
it was morally and logically founded upon a rock. The
Act of 1920 ended for ever this phase of the Irish Problem.

During the whole of 1920 the murder campaign grew
and spread in Ireland. The scale of the outrages increased.
In one ambush fifteen out of seventeen auxiliary police were
killed. On a November moniing fourteen officers, believed

THE IRISH SPECTRE 287

by the rebels to be engaged in Intelligence work, were shot,
unarmed, several in the presence of their wives, in their
billets in Dublin. The faithful recital of these deeds would
fill a chapter. They must not further darken these pages.

In the same period considerable measures were taken
by the British Government. Large numbers of additional
troops were sent to Ireland. Armoured cars and motor-
cars, forces of police and military were organized upon an
important scale, and a special police force was formed
entirely of ex-officers and from the wartime armies. These
special police, who ultimately amormted to 7,000 men,
were nicknamed on account of their dark cap and khaki
rmiform the ‘ Black and Tans.' It has become customary
to lavidi abuse upon the Black and Tans and to treat
them as a mob of bravos and terrorists suddenly let
loose upon the fair pastures of Ireland. In fact, how-
ever, they were selected from a great press of appli-
cants on accotmt of their intelligence, their characters
and their records in the war. Originally they were
intended to supplement the hard-pressed Royal Irish Con-
stabulary ; but in grappling with murder they developed
within themsdves a very strong counter-terrorist activity.
They acted with much the same freedom as the Chicago or
New York police permit themselves in dealing with armed
gangs. When any of their own men or police or military
comrades were murdered they ‘ beat up ' the haimts of
well-known maJignants, or those whom they conceived to be
malignants, and sharply challenged suspected persons at the
pistol's point. Obviously there can be no defence for such
conduct except the kind of attack to which it was a reply.

Liberals who had always supported Home Rule were on
strong ground when they dwelt upon the consequences of
its denial. They were reinforced by another school of
thought which had much less justice or logic behind it.
A certain number of high Tories, while rigidly opposing
any effective concession to Irish Nationalist demands, were
stiU more violent in their denunciations of the Black and
Tans. They demanded that the Government should strictly
and inflexibly maintain order by the regular processes of
law, and that it should punish unsparingly any of its agents

The Black
and Tans.

288 THE WORLD CRISIS: the aftermath

The Military
View.

who, no matter what the provocation, departed a hair’s
breadth from the orthodox procedure of a civilized state in
time of peace. ‘ Maintain the Union,’ they cried, ' and do
not give way to violence. Adhere with circumspection to
the law of the land. Detect and arrest the criminals and
bring them to justice before the Courts.' This was easy
to prescribe but impossible to perform. Where no witnesses
would give evidence or could give it only at the peril of
their lives, where no juries would convict, the ordinary
processes of law were non-existent.

From another angle the military authorities contributed
unhelpful counsel. Headed by the Chief of the Imperial
General Staff, Sir Hemy Wilson, they demanded incessantly
universal martial law throughout Southern Ireland. How
this would have solved the problem was never explained.
These military authorities were vehement in repudiating
any suggestion of counter-terrorism. They contented
themselves with vague assertions that putting rebellious
Ireland under martial law ' would show that the Govern-
ment was in earnest.’ I never received during my tenure
of the War Office any practical or useful advice on this
subject from these quarters. My military advisers also
naturally complained continuously of the strain on the
troops, the bulk of them post-war recruits, in having to
live month after month in the constant expectation of
being murdered by some apparently inoffensive member
of the dvil population. They dwelt with insistence, both
in my time and in that of my successor. Sir Laming
Worthington-Evans, on the urgent need of reinforcing
the army in Ireland and simultaneously relieving the bulk
of the existing garrison. By an occult and unstudied com-
bination between the opinions of the Tory legalists and
those of the military martial law men — ^martial law being
no law — ^the decision was induced and announced in Parlia-
ment that ‘ authorized reprisals ’ such as would have ruled
in a war zone, and these only, should be adopted. AH
unauthorized action on the part of the police or the special
police was to be repressed with rigour.

This resolve came with great relief to the Irish secret
societies. To do them justice, they were almost the only

THE IRISH SPECTRE

289

people in the whole world who were not shocked by the Authorized
activities of the Black and Tans. They thought it fair
that their own measure should be meted out to them.

By the end of 1920 they found themselves extremely hard
pressed by the activities of the Black and Tans, who,
with increasing information and ruthlessness, were striking
down in the darkness those who struck from the dcirk-
ness. IVtr. Lloyd George went so far as to say at the Guild-
hall Banquet on November 9, ' We have murder by the
throat.’

The policy of ' authorized reprisals ' came into force on
New Year’s Day 1921. It speedily proved far less effective
than the rough and ready measures of the special police.

On the morrow of an outrage the military sallied forth in a
brigade to bum a cottage ; in the night the Sinn Feiners
padded out and burnt a country house.

Meanwhile, the actual power of the British forces to go
wherever they wished and do whatever they thought proper
never encountered appreciable opposition. Sweeps were
made by cavalry and motor-cars on 30- or 40-mile fronts,
and every male taken into the net was meticulously examined,
often without a single person being found accountable.

And perhaps that same night an audacious murder took
place on the very ground so thoroughly scoured. It was
dear by the early summer of 1921 that Britain was at the
parting of the wa37s. It would have been quite easy to
queU the odious and shameful form of warfare by which
we were assailed and into which we were being increasingly
drawn, by using the ruthlessness which the Russian Com-
munists adopt towards their fellow countrymen. The
arrest of large numbers of persons believed by the police
to be in sympathy with the rebels and the summary execu-
tion of four or five of these hostages (many of whom must
certainly have been innocent) for every life taken of a
Government servant, might have been a remedy at once
sombre and ef&cadous. It was a course of which the
British people in the hour of their deliverance were utterly
incapable. Public opinion recoiled with anger and irritation
even from the partial measures into which our agents had
been gradually drawn. The choice was by now dearly open :

T

The Prime

Minister's

Attitude.

290 THE WORLD CRISIS : the aftermath

' r. msTi them, with iron and unstinted force, or try to give
them what they want.’ These were the only alternatives,
and though each had ardent advocates, most people were
rmprepared for either.

Here indeed was the Irish Spectre — horrid and inexorciz-
ahle I

4e :|c H: ^

No British Government in modem times has ever appeared
to mate so complete and sudden a reversal of policy as that
which ensued. In May the whole power of the State and aU
the influence of the Coalition were used to ‘ hunt down the
murder gang ’ : in June the goal was ‘ a lasting reconcilia-
tion with the Irish people.’ The vivid contrast between
these two extremes might well furnish a theme of mockery
to superficial judgment. Actually, however, there were
only two courses : war with the utmost violence or peace
with the utmost patience. Vast argument could be
deployed for either course, but nothing in sense or mercy
could excuse weak compromises between the two. In
ordinary domestic pohtics these sharp dichotomies are
usually inapplicable ; but when the sword is bared and the
pistol pointed, and blood flows and homes are laid waste,
it ought to be one thing or the other.

The legend has obtained some credence that this dia-
metrical change of policy arose from a waning nerve power
in the Prime Minister. For instance. Sir Nevil Macready
has suggested in his recently pubhshed memoirs that he
found Mr. Uoyd George concerned about his personal'
safety. Such insinuations are contrary to fact. Up till
the summer of 1921 no one was more resolute or ready
to be more ruthless against the Irish rebellion than
Mr. Lloyd George. He had constantly to measure the
British political situation. This required as a prelude to
any form of Home Rule, first the security of Ulster and
secondly a dear -victory over the gunmen. The first
condition was broadly satisfied by the 1920 Act : the
second -was certainly not yet attained. What then were
the causes and inddents which induced him to abandon
his policy of repression before it was effective ? I shall set
them out as I measured them at the time.

THE IRISH SPECTRE

291

By April 1921 the Irish problem had become the main
preoccupation of the Government. The Prime Minister
showed himself markedly disposed to fight the matter out
at all costs, and to rely for this purpose upon ‘ the age-
long loyalties of the Conservative Party.’ The Cabinet
were at one with him in this. Upon the method, however,
there were two distinct opinions. It was evident to all
Ministers that efforts to restore order in Ireland must be
made during the rest of the year upon an extraordinary
scale. A hundred thousand new special troops and police
must be raised ; thousands of motor-cars must be armoured
and equipped ; the three Southern Provinces of Ireland
must be closely laced with cordons of blockhouses and
barbed wire ; a S37Stematic rummaging and questioning of
every individual must be put in force. In order to paralyse
the activities of a few thousand persons the entire population
must when required be made to account for every hour of
their time. There was no physical bar to accompHshing all
this. It was a matter of men and money, and both would
have been supplied in ample measure by a Parliament
which still had three years of constitutional life. These
were the kind of projects which now came bluntly into
view.

Some Ministers, of whom I was one, while ready to imder-
take the responsibilities and to share the exertions which
such a policy involved, held that these drastic processes
diould be accompanied by the ofier of the widest possible
measure of self-government to Southern Ireland. ‘ Let us,’
they said, ‘ lay aside every impediment ; let us make
it dear that the Irish people are being forced by Sinn
Fein to fight not for Home Rule, but for separation ;
not for an Irish Parliament under the Crown, but for a
revolutionary Repubhc.’ An impressive debate in Cabinet
took place upon this issue. Personally I widied to see the
Irish confronted on the one hand with the realization
of all that they had asked for, ^d of all that Gladstone
had striven for, and upon fhe other with the most
unlimited exercise of rough-handed force. I was therefore
on the side of those who wished to couple a tremendous
onslaught with the fairest offer. It will be suffident to

Cabinet

Diver-

gencies-

The Craig,
de Valera
Interview.

29a THE WORLD CRISIS: the aftermath

say that the division of opinion was almost evenly balanced,
but that weight, apart from numbers, inclined to those who
preferred the dual policy. The Prime Minister was aston-
ished and indeed startled to find how many Conservatives
adhered to this more complicated course. I could see that
he was profoundly impressed both by the argument and
by the authority behind it. On the question being put
‘ Would you then allow a Dublin Parliament like any other
Dominion to levy a tariff against British goods ? ’ the
answer was fiercely made, ' How can this petty matter be
weighed against the grievous action we are preparing ? '
As usual when there is a deep and honest division in a
Cabinet united on main issues, nothing was settled at the
moment and everyone went home to chew the cud. I
must record my opinion that Mr. Lloyd George reached the
conclusion that a pohcy of unmitigated repression in Ireland
would not command whole-hearted support even among the
Conservatives.

The Prime Minister had on several occasions in the name
of the Cabinet offered to negotiate for a settlement, provided
the Irish rebels were prepared to accept the Crown and the
Imperial connection. Renewed efforts were now made to
establish contact. In May of 1921 Lord FitzAlan, one of
the leaders of the English Catholics, succeeded Lord French
as Viceroy. Devotion to public duty alone inspired him to
undertake so melancholy a task. Three days later. Sir J ames
Craig, Prime Minister of Northern Ireland, at the request of
Mr. Lloyd George, met Mr. de Valera m his hiding-place.
This meeting, which had been the subject of considerable
previous negotiation, was certainly a remarkable episode.
The Ulster leader, representative of all that had stood
against Home Rule, was conducted by the Sinn Fein gun-
men through long devious and secret routes to the head-
quarters Of the leader of the Irish rebellion. His robust out-
look and single-minded sense of duty to the well-being of the
Empire, joined to disdain of personal risks, capital or poli-
tical, led Sir James Craig to undertake this mission. His
conversations with the Siim Fein leader were abortive. At
the end of four hours Mr. de Valera’s recital of Irish griev-
ances had only reached the iniquities of Po3naings’ Act

THE IRISH SPECTRE

293

in the days of Henry VIL There were by that time
various reasonable excuses for terminating not a discussion,
but a lecture. Sir James Craig placed himself again in the
hands of his guides and was motored circuitously and
erratically back to Dublin. They were three in the little
car rattling and bumping over the ill-kept roads — ^two
Siim Feiners whose lives were probably forfeit, and the
Prime Minister of Orange Ulster. Suddenly behind them
arrived an armoured lorry filled with Black and Tans.
Although Sir James Craig’s conductors were not particu-
larly anxious to be scrutinized at close quarters, they
judged it prudent to let it pass them. The heavy
vehicle ran by within a foot of the little car. When,
after inquisitively continuing level for some time, it
finally drew ahead and rumbled on, the three Irishmen
so differently circumstanced exchanged glances of perfect
comprehension.

Although the actual Craig-de Valera conversations were
barren, a rope had been flung across the chasm. From that
moment British Government agents in Ireland were upon
occasion, through one chemnel or another, in touch with
the Sinn Fein Headquarters.

At the end of May Sir Nevil Macready presented a
pessimistic report upon the state of Ireland. ' While,’ he
said, ‘ I am of opinion that the troops at present in Ireland
may be depended upon to continue to do their best under
present circumstances through this summer, I am convinced
that by October, unless a peaceful solution has been reached,
it will not be safe to ask the troops to continue there another
■winter under the conditions which obtained there during
the last. Not only the men for the sake of their morale
and training should be removed out of 'the “ Irish atmo-
sphere,” but by that time there ■will be many officers who,
although they may not confess it, will in my opinion be
quite unfit to continue to serve in Ireland ■without a release
for a very considerable period. . . . Unless I am entirely
mistaken, ■the present state of affairs in Ireland, so far as
regards the troops serving there, must be brought to a
conclusion by October, or steps must be taken to relieve
practicahy the whole of the troops together ■with the great

Sir Nevil

Macready's

Report.

The King's
Speech in
Ulster.

294 THE WORLD CRISIS: the aftermath

majority of the Commanders and their staff.’ This report
was endorsed by Sir Henry Wdson. There could of course
be no question of giving effect to it. These despairing
counsels were not justified by the facts ; nor in any
case was there any possibility of rehef. Not relief, but
reinforcement on a large scale — all the old forces with new
forces added — ^was the obvious step ; and this, though
costly and troublesome, was quite practicable. Still, while
the Cabinet did not accept, they were bound to weigh
these sweeping and alarmist assertions of the Commander-
in-Chief in Ireland, endorsed, as they were, by the Chief
of the Imperial General Staff.

All these pressures and tendencies might have remained
subliminal but for the spark of an event. On June 22 the
first Parliament of Northern Ireland was to be inaugurated
by the King in person. It would not have been right for
Ministers to put in the mouth of the Sovereign words
which could only appeal to the people of Northern Ireland.
It is well known that the King, acting in harmony not
only with the letter but with the spirit of th.e Constitution,
earnestly expressed the wish that language should be used
which would appeal to the whole of his Irish subjects. South
as well as North, Green as well as Orange. The outlook of
the Sovereign, lifted high above the strife of Party, above the
clash of races and religions, and sectional divergencies of view,
necessarily and naturally comprised the general interest of
the Empire as a whole — ^and nothing narrower. The Prime
Minister and leading Members of the Government therefore
took the responsibility whidh rested with them, and with
them alone, of inserting in the Royal Speech what was in
effect a sincere appeal for a common effort to end the
odious and disastrous conflict.

'The eyes of the whole Empire,’ said the King with
evident emotion, ‘ are on Ireland to-day — ^that Empire in
which so many nations and races have come together in
spite of ancient feuds, and in which new nations have come
to birth within the lifetime of the youngest in this Hall. I
am emboldened by that thought to look beyond the sorrow
and the anxiety which have clouded of late My vision of
Irish affairs. I speak from a full heart when I pray that
My coming to Ireland to-day may prove to be the first step

THE IRISH SPECTRE

295

towards an end of strife amongst her people, whatever TheRes-
their race or creed. ponse.

‘ In that hope I appeal to all Irishmen to pause, to stretch
out the hand of forbearance and conciliation, to forgive and
to forget, and to join in making for the land which Ihey love
a new era of peace, contentment, and good will. It is My
earnest desire that in Southern Ireland too there may ere long
take place a parallel to what is now passing in this Hall ;
that there a similar occasion may present itself and a similar
ceremony be performed.

' For this the Parhament of the United Kingdom has in the
fullest measure provided the powers ; for this the Parlia-
ment of Ulster is pointing the way. The future lies in the
hands of My Irish people themselves. May this historic
gathering be the prelude of a day in which the Irish people.

North and South, under one Parhament or two, as those
Parhaments may themselves decide, shall work together
in common love for Ireland upon the sure foundation of
mutual justice and respect.’

No one responsible for the King’s Speechhad contemplated
immediate results in action. But in such declarations every-
thing depends upon the sounding-board. The King-Emperor,
the embodiment of the common inheritance, discharging
his constitutional duty at the peril of his Hfe, had struck
a note which rang and reverberated, and which all ears
were attuned to hear. The response of pubhc opinion in
both islands to that appeal was instant, deep, and wide-
spread, and from that moment events moved forward in
unbroken progression to the establishment of the Irish Free
State. On June 24 Mr. Lloyd George invited Sir James
Craig and Mr. de Valera to a conference in London.

On July ir the invitations were accepted, and a truce, the
terms of which had been settled on the 9th, was proclaimed.

No act of British state policy in ■^yhich I have been con-
cerned aroused more violently conflicting emotions than the
Irish Settlement. For a system of human government so
vast and so variously composed as the British Empire to
compact with open rebellion in the peculiar form in which
it was developed in Irdand, was an event which might well
have shaken to its foimdations that authority upon which'
the peace and order of hundreds of millions of people of
many races and communities were erected. Servants of

A Grave
Decision.

296 THE WORLD CRISIS : the aftermath

the Crown in the faithful performance of their duty had been
and were being cruelly murdered as a feature in a dehberately
adopted method of warfare. It was only possible to say of
those responsible for these acts that they were not actuated
by selfish or sordid motives ; that they were ready to lay
down their own lives ; and that in the main they were
supported by the sentiment of their fellow countrymen.
To receive the leaders of such men at the Council Board,
and to attempt to form through their agency the govern-
ment of a civilized state, must be regarded as one of the
most questionable and hazardous experiments upon which a
great Empire in the plenitude of its power had ever embarked.

On the other hand stood the history of Ireland — an
unending quarrel and mutual injuries done to each other
by sister countries and close neighbours, generation after
generation ; and the earnest desire in Britain was to end
this hateful feud. During the nineteenth century both
England and Ireland had re-stated their cases in forms
far superior to those of the dark times of the past. Eng-
land had lavished remedial measures and conciliatory
procedures upon Ireland ; Ireland in the main had rested
herself upon constitutional action to support her claim.
It would have been possible in 1886 to have reached a
solution on a basis infinitely less perilous both to Ireland
and to Great Britain than that to which we were ultimately
drawn. Said Mr. Gladstone in the House of Commons
before the fateful division on the Home Rule Bill, ‘ Ireland
stands at your bar expectant, hopeful, almost suppliant.
Her words are words of truth and soberness. She asks a
blessed obhvion of the past, and in that oblivion our interest
is deeper even than hers. . . . Think, I beseech you — ^think
well, think wisely ; think not for the moment but for the
years that are to come, before you reject this Bill.'

And, after all, we were the victors in the greatest struggle
of all time. We did not claim more than our true share
in those supreme events, but it was sufi&cient to make us
easy in our own minds about a matter so comparatively
small in a material sense as Ireland. No one, for instance,
could say that the life of the Empire was in danger when
every hostile force in the world, including armies of milli ons

THE IRISH SPECTRE

297

of soldiers had passed out of existence, when the German The Trace,
fleet lay at the bottom of Scapa Flow, and when every armed
opponent was prostrate. No one could say we were a
cowardly or decadent race. There may be no logical rele-
vance for such thoughts, but they contributed an important
factor to the national decision. And what was the alter-
native ? It was to plimge one small comer of the Empire
into an iron repression, which could not be carried through
without an admixture of murder and counter-murder, terror
and counter-terror. Only national self-preservation could
have excused such a policy, and no reasonable man could
allege that self-preservation was involved.

However, the die was now cast. A tmce had been pro-
claimed. The gunmen emerged from their hiding-places
and strode the streets of Dublin as the leaders of a nation
as old and as proud as our own. The troops amd police
and Black and Tans, but yesterday urged on to extirpate
the murder gang, now stood relaxed and embarrassed
while parleys on equal terms were in full swing. Im-
possible thereafter to resume the same kind of war I
Impossible to refill or heat up again those cauldrons of
hatred and contempt on which such quarrels are fed !

Other courses remained at oiu: disposal as a last resort.

Ports and cities could be held; Dublin could be held;

Ulster could be defended ; all communication between Sinn
Fein Ireland and the outer world could be severed ; all trade
between the two islands, that is to say the whole of Irish
trade except from Ulster, could be stopped — at a price.

But from the moment of the truce, the attempt to govern
Southern Ireland upon the authority of the Imperial Parlia-
ment had come to an end.

It is no part of this tale to record, except in outline, the
course of the negotiations or to recite the documents and
records in which their public interchange was embodied.

The opening contact was however notable. On July 14
the first of several interviews took place between Mr. de
Valera and Mr. Lloyd George in the Cabinet Room at
10, Downing Street. Mr. de Valera had himself introduced
with ceremony by ‘ the representative of the Irish Republic
in London ’ (Mr. Art O’Brien). The Prime Minister, never

Prolonged

Negotia-

tions.

298 THE WORLD CRISIS : the afteiimath

a greater artist than in the first moments of a fateful inter-
view, received the Irish chieftain cordially as a brother
Celt. Mr. de Valera was guarded and formal. He presented
a lengthy document in the Irish language, and then for
convenience a translation in English. The Prime Minister’s
literary curiosity was excited by its heading : ‘ Saorstat
Eireann.’ ‘ Saorstat,’ he remarked, did not strike his ear
as Irish. What was its literal translation ? After a pause
Mr . de Valera replied that literally it meant ' Free State.'

‘ I see,’ said the Prime Minister, ' Saorstat means Free
State ; then what is your Irish word for Republic ? ’ While
the two Irishmen were discussing together in English what
answer they should give to this innocent question, the
Prime Minister turned to Professor Thomas Jones of the
Cabinet Secretariat and conversed with him in Welsh to
the evident discomfiture of his English-speaking Sinn Fein
visitors. Eventually, as Mr. de Valera could get no further
than that Saorstat meant Free State, the Prime Minister
observed : ‘ Must we not admit that the Celts never were
Republicans and have no native word for such an idea ? ’
A long embarrassed silence followed. This was the first move
in a dialogue continued for many hours imtil, after an ex-
haustive survey of Irish history in ancient and mediaeval
times, it became clear that progress cozxld only be made
by the British Government tabling its own proposals.

These were handed to Mr. de Valera on July 20. They
comprised complete Dominion Home Rule involving, of
course, autonomous control of finance and taxation, of the
police and the military. Six conditions were attached.
Four dealt with the naval and military aspects ; one pro-
hibited protective duties between the two islainds, and the
last imposed upon Ireland a share to be fairly determined
of the jointly contracted national debt. These proposals
were rejected by Mr. de Valera, who prodaitnedthe principle
of complete independence and repudiated the Crown. The
Prime Minister in his replies made it plain that the British
Government could discuss no settlement 'which involves
a refusal on the part of Ireland to accept our invitation
to a free, equal, and loyal partnership in the British
Commonwealth tmder one Sovereign.’ The correspondence

THE IRISH SPECTRE

299

became lengthy and the difficulties no smaller. The Cabinet, WiMn tte
at that time scattered in the holiday season, met on Sep-
tember 7 at Inverness. Two courses appeared to be open :
to summon Mr. de Valera to a conference conditional on
allegiance to the Crown ; or to resume the rmconditional
parleys with him in the presence of other Irish representa-
tives. The reply which was eventually settled asked
whether Mr. de Valera was prepared to enter a conference
to ascertain ‘ how the association of Ireland with the com-
munity of nations known as the British Empire can best
be reconciled with Irish national aspirations.’ If the
answer was in the affirmative, a conference at Inverness was
proposed for the 20th.

On September 12, Mr. de Valera wrote accepting this
invitation : but in his letter he stated : —

‘ Our nation has formally declared its independence and
recognizes itself as a sovereign State. It is only as the
representatives of that State and as its chosen guardians
that we have any authority or powers to act on behalf of
OTir people.’

On this the Prime Minister dismissed the two Irish
emissaries who bore the message to his retreat at Gairloch,
and cancelled the arrangements for the conference.

Nevertheless there was a well-founded feding that neither
side wished to see the whole parley break down, and the
letters and telegrams continued to pass backwards and
forwards perseveringly. Mr. de 'Valera would no doubt
have gone on indefinitely fighting theoretical points without
the shghtest regard to the resultant misery and material
ruin of his countr3nnen. But meanwhile, behind the tightly
closed doors of the Bail, in almost continuous session at
Dublin, and in the central conclaves of the Sinn Fein ex-
tremists, a definite and resolute movement of opinion grew
up against him. Anarchy, stark, sheer and progressively
degenerating might at any moment lay its talons upon
Southern Ireland. Ihe genius of the Irish race has a
soberly practical side, and men, with forces behind them,
stood forth from the confusion, men whose melancholy
credentials could not be impugned, but whose aims were
sane and whose word was their bond. These men were

300 THE WORLD CRISIS : the aftermath

The Irish determined not to tiirow away what had been gained.

Conference, vvliisper of these divisions in Sinn Fein had yet reached
the outer air. But Mr. de Valera's reply to the Prime
Minister's cancellation of the conference was appreciably
more conciliatory. Eventually he explained that he and
his friends had no thought of committing the British Govern-
ment to any conditions as a prelude to a conference. They
could not abandon their national position, but neither did
they expect a shnUar surrender by the British Government.
A treaty he suggested between Great Britain and Ireland
would end the dispute for ever and enable the two nations,
each pursuing its own development, to work together in
free and friendly co-operation in affairs of common concern.
He invited the Prime Minister to state whether the British
Government was demanding a surrender of the Sinn Fein
position as a preliminary to conference or whether the
conference could open free on both sides. The Cabinet
Committee which met at Gairloch on September 21 , in
these circumstances, after reiterating their fundamental
position, drafted a fresh invitation, sent on the 19th,
to a conference in London on October ii where they
could meet the delegates of Siim Fein ' with a view to
ascertaining how the association of Ireland with the
community of nations known as the British Empire might
best be reconciled with Irish aspirations.' This invitation,
sufficiently vague in character, was accepted and on the
appointed date the Prime Minister, Mr. Chamberlain,
Lord Birkenhead, Sir Laming Worthington-Evans, Sir
Hamar Greenwood and myself met. the Irish represen-
tatives, Mr. Griffith, Mr. Michael Collins, Mr. Barton,
Mr. Gavan Duffy and Mr. Duggan in the Cabinet Room
at Downing Street. It was significant that Mr. de Valera
remained in Ireland.

lie 4c )|c )|t 3|t

It is not easy to measure the internal stresses set up in
the Unionist Party by these events. Although everyone in
every Peirty had been swept from his political socket by
the cataract of world events ; although human fortunes
still ran in rapids ah over the world, and men were baffled
and bewildered by aU that was going on and exhausted by

THE IRISH SPECTRE

301

all that had happened, yet the giving np in these ignominious
circumstances of life-long convictions was alm ost intoler-
able. Resentment gathered all the deeper because those
who felt the most keenly and were among the most tenacious
elements of the nation knew that they were powerless.
Ulster remained deeply agitated and refused to associate
with the Government. The 300,000 Loyalists in Southern
Ireland, perfectly helpless in the fighting, raised a lament-
able cry in the parley.

At this stage much depended upon the action of individual
Ministers. It was easy for Liberals and Home Rulers to
support the widest form of Irish self-government, but those
whose whole political careers had been absorbed in figh tin g
Home Rule had a disagreeable and hazardous task to
accomplish. The chief responsibility fell upon the leader
of the Unionist Party, Mr. Austen Chamb^lain. He had
acted throughout in the closest harmony with the Prime
Minister, and he was a man prepared to carry his actions
to their conclusion and to face any consequences personal
to himself.

When a leader takes a course fundamentally divergent
from the whole traditions and even character of his
Party, it is often open to some other prominent man to
acquire great and possibly dominant political power. No
one can impugn his motives ; he is only carrjing on
in the old way, in a straightforward, simple and con-
sistent mann^. Such a man will find himself sustained
by great numbers of persons of the highest integrity.
His actions, however favourable to his ambition, will
always appear to be sanctioned by duty and conviction.
The attitude of Lord Birkenhead, then Lord Chancellor,
was therefore at this jtmcture of the utmost import-
ance. He was prominently and peculiarly connected with
the resistance to Home Rule. He had been in comradeship
with Sir Edward Carson ; he had used to the full those
threats of dvil war which had played their part in
the 1914 phase of the Irish conflict. There was no
man who would have gained greater personal advantage
by opposing the Iririi Settlement ; and none who
would sufier more reproach by sustaining it. He now

Stresses in
tiie Unionist
Party.

Political

Tension.

303 THE WORLD CRISIS : the aftermath

appeared, in the teeth alike of his past and his future, as
its most aggressive Conservative supporter. The Irish Free
Staters have always felt that they owed him their gratitude
— and they are right. At this juncture qualities of in-
dependent and fearless judgment in the leader of the
Unionist Party and in his most powerful lieutenant played
their part in history. Political systems can to some
extent be appraised by the test of whether their leading
representatives are or are not capable of taking decisions
in great matters on their merits, in defiance of their own
interests and often of their best friends.

In due course, after many delays and much manceuvring,
the Irish Delegates arrived in Downing Street, and those
Members of the Cabinet who from their of&ces or from their
personalities were deemed to be the chief actors met across
the table those whom they had so recently denounced as
' The Murder Gang.' All these Irish Delegates had recently
been in prison or had been hunted for their lives, and some
in varying degrees had been associated with violent crime.
The confrontation was not without its shock, and for
some weeks the strictest formalities were observed. Not
only were the discussions themselves baffling through
their vagueness and uncertainty, but they were cumbered
with a bulky mass of intricate and highly explosive detail.
The negotiations, private and public, were continued for
two months. They were reacted upon at all stages by the
internal stresses of the Conservative Party and the con-
vulsions of the newly reassembled Irish Dail. Disorders
broke out in Belfast. The Ulster Government declared that
they were being betrayed and, although they refused to come
to the Conference, complained that they were not even
consulted. The political tension was almost as acute as in
the months before the war, but without the solvent of
catastrophic events. Things merely lagged ; the Irish could
not say ‘ yes ' or ' no ’ to anything. The condition of Ireland
degenerated daily, and the Conservative Party with two-
thirds of the House of Commons in its r anks stirred with
anger and distress.

Although I only played at this time a part of second rank
in Irish affairs and therefore did not fed the full pressures.

THE IRISH SPECTRE

303

I had as a member of the Cabinet Committee a decided
opinion. We must go through "with the business and
persevere until we either were dismissed from power, or
reached a settlement, or reopened in a new form hos-
tilities against Southern Ireland. I urged that Ministers
could not escape from their miseries by resignation. The
desire for release was in the early part of November so
general that no one could predict the fortunes of a single
day. The degree of the crisis can perhaps in after days
be as well measured by the following letter — of no par-
ticular consequence — as by any other test.

Mr. Churchill to the Prime Minister.

Nov. 9, 1921.

The criticism will certainly be made that the Govermnent
in resigning have abdicated their responsibility. More
especially ■wffl this charge be made if the reason given is
‘ we are debarred by honour from coercing the North, and
by conviction from coercing the South.' It will be said,
‘here are men united in principle, knowing what they
ought to do and what the interests of the country require,
who are possessed of an overwhelming Parhamentary
majority, including a majority of their own followers,
who nevertheless without facing Parliament throw down
the commission and declare themselves incapable of action
in any direction.'

I greatly fear the consequences of such tactics, no matter
how lofty may be the motives which prompt them.

2. After this has occurred, Mr. Bonax Law will be invited
to form a Government. Why should he not do so ? Smrely
he would be bound in honour to do so, if the members of
the present Government have declared ihemselves inhibited
from moving in any direction. Why should he not suc-
ceed ? . . . In the crisis under consideration, the Con-
servative Party will have to rally to someone. Obviously
they will rally to a Conservative leader, forming a Con-
servative Government, which has come forward to fill the
gap created by the suicide of the Coalition ; and which
will be entitled to carry the standard forward against
Labour at an imminent election, and to receive considerate
treatment from ex-Ministers who have just thrown up the
sponge. The delusion . that an alternative Government
cannot be formed is perennial. Mr. Chamberlain thought
Sir Henry CampbeU-Bannennan would be ‘ hissed off the

Resignation

Inad-

missible.

304 THE WORLD CRISIS : the aftermath

Add stage.’ Mr. Asquith was confident that you could not

Hatreds. foj;T^ an administration. But in neither case did the out-

going administration tie its hands in every direction by
proclaiming itself honourably boimd to do what the situa-
tion might require.

On these lines a very ^eat public disaster might easily
ensue, in which a reactionary Conservative Government
might go forward to the polls against Labour, with the
great central mass of England and Scotland rem aining
without leadership or decisive influence.

3. I wish to put on record that I consider that it is our
duty to carry forward the policy about Ireland in which
we believe, until we are defeated in the House of Commons,
and thus honourably relieved from oux duty to the
Crown. . . .

From the outset it became of the utmost importance
to convince those who were now accepted as the Irish
leaders, of the sincerity and good wiU of the Imperial
Government. The issue was too grave for bargaining and
haggling. We stated from the very begiiming all that we
were prepared to give, and that in no circumstances could
we go any further. We also made it clear that if our offer
were accepted, we would without hesitation carry it through
without regard to any political misfortune which might
in consequence fall upon the Government or upon its leading
Members. On this basis, therefore, and in this spirit the
long and critical negotiations were conducted.

We found ourselves confronted in the early days not
only with the unpractical and visionary fanaticism and
romanticism of the extreme Irish secret societies, but also
with those tides of distrust and hatred which had flowed
between the two countries for so many centuries. An
essential element in d3mamite and every other high explo-
sive is some intense add. These terrible liquids slowly
and elaborately prepared unite with perfectly innocent
carbon compoimds to give that pent-up, concentrated
blasting power which shatters the structures and the fives
of men. Hatred plays the same part in Government as
acids in chemistry. And here in Ireland were hatreds
which in Mr. Kipling’s phrase would ‘ eat the five steel
from the rifle butt,’ hatreds such as, thank God, in Great

THE IRISH SPECTRE

305

Britain had not existed for a hundred years. All this we The tnti-

-I j , matum.

had to overcome.

Mr. GrifSth was a writer who had studied deeply European
history and the polity of States. He was a man of great
firmness of character and of high integrity. He was that
unusual figure — a silent Irishman ; he hardly ever said
a word. But no word that ever issued from his lips in my
presence did he ever unsay. Michael Collins had not en-
joyed the same advantages in education as his elder col-
league. But he had elemental qualities and mother wit
which were in many ways remarkable. He stood far nearer
to the terrible incidents of the conflict than his leader.

His prestige and influence with the extreme parties in
Ireland for that reason were far higher, his difflculties
in his own heart and with his associates were far greater.

The other delegates were overshadowed by the two leaders.

Mr. Duggan, however, was a sober-minded, resolute man.

In the background Mr. Erskine Childers, though not a
delegate, pressed extreme counsels.

In the end, after two months of futilities and rigmarole,
scarred by outrages in Ireland in breach of the truce,
unutterably wearied Ministers faced the Irish Delegates,
themselves in actual desperation and knowing well that
death stood at their dbows. When we met on the afternoon
of December 5, the Prime Minister stated bluntly that
we could concede no more and debate no further. They
must settle now; they must sign the agreement for a
Treaty in the form to which after all these weeks it had
attained, or else quit ; and further, that both sides would
be free to resume whatever warfare they could wage against
each other. This was an ultimatum delivered, not through
diplomatic chsumels, but face to face, and all present
knew and understood that nothing else was possible. Stiff
as our personal relations had been, there was by now a
mutual respect between the principals and a very deep
comprdiension of each other’s difficulties.

The Irishmen gulped down the ultimatum phlegmatically.

Mr. Griffith said, speaking in his soft voice and with his
modest manner, ' I will give the answer of the Irish Dele-
gates at nine to-night ; but, Mr. Prime Minister, I per-

u

The Agree-
ment
Signed.

306 THE WORLD CRISIS : the aftermath

sonally will sign this agreement and wiU recommend it
to my countrymen/ ‘ Do I understand, Mr. Griffith,’
said Mr. Lloyd George, ‘ that though everyone else refuses
you win nevertheless agree to sign ? ’ ‘Yes, that is so,
Mr. Prime Minister,’ replied this quiet little man of great
heart and of great purpose. Michael Collins rose looking
as if he was going to shoot someone, preferably himself.
In aU my life I have never seen so much passion and suffering
in restraint.

We then w'ent off and drummed our heels and had some
food and smoked, and discussed plans of campaign. No
one expected that anyone but Mr. Griffith would agree,
and what validity would his solitary signature possess ?
As for ourselves, we had already ruptured the loyalties
of our friends and supporters.

The British Representatives were in their places at
nine, but it was not until long after midnight that the
Irish Delegation appeared. As before, they were super-
ficially calm and very quiet. There was a long pause, or
there seemed to be. Then Mr. Griffith said, ‘ Mr. Prime
Minister, the Delegation is willing to sign the agreements,
but there are a few points of drafting which perhaps it
would be convenient if I mentioned at once.’ Thus, by
the easiest of gestures, he carried the whole matter into
the region of minor detail, and everyone concentrated
upon these points with overstrained interest so as to drive
the main issue into the background for ever.

Soon we were talMng busily about technicalities and
verbal corrections, and holding firmly to all these lest worse
should befall. But underneath this protective chatter a
profound change had taken place in the spirit and atmo-
sphere. We had become allies and associates in a common
cause — ^the cause of the Irish Treaty and of peace between
two races and two islands. It was nearly three o’clock in
the morning before we separated. But the agreement Was
signed by all. As the Irishmen rose to leave, the Britidi
Ministers upon a strong impulse walked round and for the
first time shook hands. We shall see in later chapters
how many toils and vexations lay in the path of the
Iridi Settlement, and how many disappointments and

THE IRISH SPECTRE

307

anxieties were in store for both sides. But this was Lloyd
the moment, not soon to be forgotten, when the waters
were parted and the streams of destiny began to flow
down new valleys towards new seas.

The event was fatal to the Prime Minister. Within a
year he had been driven from power. Many other causes,
some at least of which could have been avoided, contributed
to his fall ; but the Irish Treaty and its circumstances
were unforgivable by the most tenacious elements in the
Conservative Party, Even among those who steadfastly
supported it there were many who said, ‘It must needs be
that offences come, but woe to that man by whom the
offence cometh.’ Yet in so far as Mr. Lloyd George can link
his political misfortunes with this Irish story, he may be
content. In falling through Irish difficulties he may fall
with Essex and with Strafford, with Pitt and with Glad-
stone ; and with a line of sovereigns and statesmen great
or small spread across the English history books of 700
years. But Lloyd George falls with this weighty difference,
that whereas all these others, however great their efforts
and sacrifices, left behind them only a problem, he has
achieved — must we not hope it ? — a. solution.

♦

CHAPTER XV

THE IRISH SETTLEMENT

‘ Tout savoir, c’est tout comprendre.’

De Valera’s Repudiation — The Debate in the Bail — become
Responsible for carrying out the Treaty — ^The Main Objectives —
The Defence of Ulster — ^Irish Leaders — A Preliminary Survey —
Craig and Collins — ^The Irish Free State Bill — ^The Boundary
Question — Passage of the Bill — ^Limerick and Tipperary —
Letter to Mr. Collins — Rory O’Connor seizes the Four Courts
— Further Letter to Mr. (Filins — A Further Letter.

De Valera’s rT^HE relief of the public at the Irish Settlement was
Repudia ^ manifest. There was a general feeling of awaking
from a nightmare. The whole Empire rejoiced, and foreign
countries smiled approvingly, if sardonically. The King
took the unusual and indeed unprecedented step of receiving
the Ministers concerned at Buckingham Palace in the
early morning and had a photograph taken with himself
in their midst. No one was more dehghted than the poor,
ordinary people of Ireland who had been so mauled by both
sides and who longed for peace and comfort. This, how-
ever, they were not to have for some time.

The Sinn Fein Delegates returned to Dubhn immediately
and presented the result of their labours to Mr. de Valera
and the Dail. It would be easy to prove that in logic de
Valera was committed by his previous declarations not
indeed to the actual form of the agreement but to its scope
and principle. Moreover, the Irish Delegates were pleni-
potentiaries and he was their chief. They had come as
his representatives to London. He had been continually
kept informed of the whole process of negotiation. They
had gained in substance, if not in theory, aU that they
had striven for and far more than any other Irish leaders
had ever demanded. It was therefore generally expected
that he would stand by his colleagues, make allowances for
their difi&cidties, and even if not satisfied on this or that

308

THE IRISH SETTLEMENT

309

theoretical point would throw in his lot with them. After The Debate
aU, Southern Ireland had acquired the whole constitutional *
position of a Dominion, that is to say, independence under
the Crown plus aU the good offices of Great Britain.

But we speedily learned that Mr. de Valera was still
maundering about Po3mings’ Act, and that his view of
Anglo-Irish relations and of the griefs of Ireland had not
yet reached the sixteenth-centruy part of the story. He
now made a passionate endeavour to reopen the conflict,
and conceiving himself as head of the only government exist-
ing in Ireland, he repudiated the action of the Delegates, who
were also his colleagues and had been his fellow-conspira-
tors. These men, reproached as traitors to their cause
and to the oaths of their secret societies, were however
immediately found to be in possession, even in the ranks
of the extremists, of a strong separate power. Two of the
Irish signatories out of the five went over to de Valera,
but Arthur Griffith, supported by Duggan, acted with energy
and conviction, and Michael Collins, carrying with him the
principal gunmen and the majority of the inmost circles
of the Irish Republican Brotherhood, stood by his friend.

While their territory was still in the utmost confusion
the Dail proceeded to debate the Treaty, for weeks at a
time. They adjourned at length to celebrate the nativity
of the Saviour, and when they resumed in January they
were cleft in twain. On January 8 the vote was taken and
the Treaty was carried by seven votes — 64 against 57.

De Valera resigned his Presidency and quitted the Chambw.

All the Republicans having walked out, Mr. Arthur Griffith
was elected President of the Dail, which then was immedi-
ately adjourned.

Shortly after the signing of the Treaty I became a
principal in British-Irish affairs. In January 1921, the
Prime Minister had asked me to go from the War Office to
the Colonial Office for the purpose of settling our affairs in
Palestine and Mesopotamia. This work was now nearly
done. The Arabs and Colonel Lawrence were appeased by
the enthronement of King Feisal at Bagdad ; the British
Army in Mesopotamia, which had been costing thirty millions
a year, had been brought home ; and complete tranquillity

310 THE WORLD CRISIS: the aftermath

I become was preserved by the Royal Air Force under the guidance
of thrifty Trenchard. ^ Apart from ordinary work I was

out the therefore free. Southern Ireland as a Dominion fell con-
stitutionally into the sphere of the Colonial Ofi6.ce. I took
over the task from the Chief Secretary, Sir Hamar Green-
wood. He had borne the brunt during the most terrible
period, showing the utmost courage as a man, and never
losing the hope of a statesmanlike solution. In my
capacity as Secretary of State I became Chairman of the
Cabinet Committee upon Irish affairs. My colleagues gave
me generous aid when I required it and a wide freedom of
action at other times. Thenceforward I conducted all the
negotiations with the Irish leaders, both North and South,
and dealt with all the Parliamentary situations in the House
of Commons.

Two objectives 'stood clearly out from the general con-
fusion and uncertainty. The first was to bring and nurse
into being in the South a living and responsible organism
of government. This could only be done by investing the
Provisional Government which we were about to recognize
with the authority of a popular election. From the moment
of publication of the Treaty, the Irish people had by every
means and method open to them loudly ejqpressed their
desire that good and peaceful relations should be established
with the British people on the basis of that settlement.
We therefore impressed upon the Provisional Government
the importance and turgency of an election, which alone
could give them the status of a national administration
and enable them to govern with native authority. Griffith
and Collins were fully persuaded of this ; but the difficulties
were enormous. Mr. de Valera, knowing himself to be
in a minority, and, as it proved, in a small minority, set
to work by every means in his power to obstruct, to delay,
and if possible to prevent, such an election. For this
purpose he had recourse to the Irish Republican Army.
This so-called Army had hitherto existed for the object
of organizing attacks on the Crown forces ranging from

* Marshal of the Air Force Sir Hugh Trenchard, Chief of the Air Staff.
Those who wish for further information on this long and intricate piece
of public business will find a memorandum in the Appendix. — W. S. C.

THE IRISH SETTLEMENT 311

individual murder to ambuscades. It had never been
capable of fighting any serious action according to the
rules of war. Nevertheless it contained a considerable
number of men perfectly ready to suffer imprisonment and
execution for what they considered to be their cause. The
Irish Republican Army was divided in opinion in the same
way and probably in the same proportions as the Bail. Yet
it was the only organization at the disposal of the Provisional
Government for the maintenance of their authority. They
were therefore forced into a series of weak and imsatis-
factory compromises upon the control of the Republican
Army and about the date and character of the elections.

They were soon led as a measure of accommodation
with Mr. de Valera to postpone the dection for three months,
relying upon his promise that then the election should be
free, that in the meanwhile the army should act unitedly
under the orders of the Provisional Government, and that
it should not interfere in the election or oppose by force
any government returned at the election. But Mr. de Valera
had no sooner made this promise to his fellow-countr37men
than he proceeded to break it. Everything was done by
him and by his friends to weaken and discredit the Pro-
visional Govenunent ; to create disorder throughout the
country, and to embroil Southern Ireland with Ulster.
For this purpose the anti-Free State portion of the Repub-
lican Army was always available, and around them and
behind them gathered those predatory and criminal elements
which in a greater or less degree exist in every society and
claim to lead in times of revolution. It was across these
difficulties that the British and Irish signatories of the
Treaty endeavoured to march to a free election and an
Irish national mandate.

The second main objective, equally vital to us, was to
sustain the Ulster Government in its indefeasible rights.
Two so-called divisions of the Irish Republican Army were
located in Ulster and were maintained iu intense secret
activity in spite of the truce, in spite of the Treaty, and in
q)ite of the fact that the evacuation of the British Army
from Southern Irelzind was rapidly and steadily proceeding.
The Ulster Government therefore found themselves at grips

The Main
Objectives,

The Defence
of Ulster.

312 THE WORLD CRISIS : the aetermath

•with a conspiracy in their midst the object of which was to
make their task of maintaining a separate government im-
possible, while at the same time from over the border serious
raids occurred and hostile forces gathered and threatened.

These menaces to Ulster both internal and from without
were met in an equally combative and bellicose manner by
the Protestant Orangemen of the North. Every outrage
committed by the Irish Republican Army or by the Catholic
element was repaid •with bloody interest. Reprisals and
counter-reprisals soon built up a ghastly score on both
sides ; the Catholics, being numerically the weaker, suffering
during the summer about twice as many casualties as the
Protestants. It was no doubt natural that the Sinn Fein
extremists, having seen the success which attended their
attack on British authority, shoidd expect by a continuance
of such methods to break down a much smaller and appar-
ently much weaker organism of government in the North.
Ha-wng, as they thought, humiliated and beaten the mighty
British Empire and forced it to make an accommodation
with them, they assumed it would be an easy matter to
make the position of a separate Ulster Government impos-
sible ; and by shooting public men and burning public
buildings to create a continuous terror, and so to weary
and impoverish the Government and the citizens of the
North that for the sake of a quiet hfe they would be willing
to submit themselves to Sinn Fein rule.

‘ In the North,’ as I said to •the House of Commons at
a later period, ‘ the large majority of the people are bitterly
opposed to Sinn Fein . They ardently proclaim their loyalty
and affection for •this country, for its monarchy, for its
constitution, and for its empire. Even if they were deserted
by Britain they would fight desperately and rightly to
preserve their freedom. But they will not be deserted by
Britain ; on the contrary, they •will be aided and strengthened
by money, arms, and men to any extent that may be
necessary to help them to maintain their Parliamentary
and pohtical rights and to defend themselves.’

These were the two separate aims by which I was guided.
They appealed very difierently to English political Parties.
All the strongest elements in the Conservative Party rallied

THE IRISH SETTLEMENT 313

to Ulster, and even while recognizing and accepting the
Treaty, recoiled with dislike and scorn from Sinn Fein Ireland.
Liberals and Labour men on the other hand watched with
tender solicitude the fortunes of the Irish Free State, and
took little interest in the welfare of the Northern Govern-
ment, except to denounce it for the reprisals with which the
Orangemen repaid every Sinn Fein murder. But if success
in undoubted measure attended our policy, it was due to
the fact that we pursued both these separate, and in many
respects antagonistic, objectives with equal earnestness.
Either alone spelt ruin. Both simultaneously pursued
led to safety and peace.

Of course the task of helping both sides in some directions,
and of restraining both as far as possible in others, was
delicate and liable to be misunderstood. It is easy to
declare that the balance should be held even ; but when
people are actually murdering each other and being
murdered, when terror stalks the land and anarchy rises
about infant administrations ; when you are in con-
stant and intimate and honourable relations with the
champions of both sides, when you know many of their
secrets and when anything done for one excites the resent-
ment or suspicion of the other, an impartial course is easier
to prescribe than to steer. Fortunately for Ireland she
did not in this time of tribulation lack chiefs of high and
firm qualities. In Arthur Griffith and Michael Collins, and
also in two new figures who now appeared, Richard Mulcahy
and Kevin O’Higgins, were found realists of the first order ;
men who feared God, who loved their country, and who kept
their word. In Ulster Sir James Craig stood solid as a rock.
Imperturbable, sagacious, above hate or anger yet not -with-
out a lively sentiment ; steady, true, and rmtiring.he brought
his own people at length out from the midst of indescribable
miseries and difficulties back to daylight and civilization.

With this general survey of scene and actors, it will be
better to tell the tale selectively by contemporary documents
rather than by summarized narrative.

I started hopefully on my duties, and endeavoured to
outline for the guidance of the Departments concerned the
immediate practical steps.

Irisli

Leaders.

A Pre-
liminary
Survey.

314 THE WORLD CRISIS : the aftermath

December 21, 1921.

‘ The Prime Minister having aisked me to preside over a
Cabinet Committee for the purpose of arranging the details
of setting up the Provisional Government in Dublin should
a favourable decision be taken by the Dail, I have put down
a few draft headings for consideration.

Should the Dail ratify, the first step should be to get
an Irish delegation, comprising Mr. Griffith and Mr. Collins,
over here at the earliest moment. We should then tell
them that we wish them to form a Provisional Government
without delay. This Grovemment should be inunediately
responsible for the whole internal peace and order of
Southern Ireland and would take executive control of the
cormtry on the basis arranged. We do not wish to continue
responsible one day longer than is absolutely necessary.
In my view we should aim at New Year’s Day for the
definite assumption of power, provided they are wiUing.
When the basis has been worked out, it will be for the
Viceroy after consultation in Dublin with such leaders of
parties and political personages as he thinks fit, to invite
some gentleman to form a Government. Presumably he
would invite Mr. Arthur Griffith, and we shall know by
then whether this gentleman will accept the commission,
and on what basis. Mr. Griffith would then form his Govern-
ment, his Ministers would sign the dedaration prescribed
in the Treaty, and take up their duties without delay.

As a general principle we should not seek to alter the
existing machinery more than is absolutely necessary, but
should place it in the hands of the new Ministers as it now
is. If statutory authority to give directions of any kind
is required and such authority cannot yet be obtained,
the British authority who now has the power to give such
directions should be told to act upon instructions received
without personal responsibihty except for execution.

The foUowmg special points occur : —

(i) ThePoUce. Everyman in the R.I.C., whether English
or Irish, should be given the option of resigning on disband-
ment-terms guaranteed by the Imperial Government. The
allocation of expense as between Great Britain and the Irish
Free State must be taken into condderation on the general
financial settlement which will be made during the present
year, so that it is only a question of accounting. AH R.I.C.
who do not exercise this option will be expected to carry on.

The Auxiliary Division will be disbanded at once at the
cost of the Imperial Government, advantage being taken
at the same time of the decision provisionally arrived at
to raise a gendarmerie for Palestine.

THE IRISH SETTLEMENT 315

(2) The Army. The principle we should proclaim is that a Re-
the whole of our military forces in Southern Ireland should

be withdrawn as quickly as convenient. The Provisional “
Government will be expected to take over the Guard of the
Viceroy and of the seat of Government with uniformed troops
of their own as the first step. The routine of salutes. Guards
of Honour, etc., due to the King’s representative must be
arranged with the Sinn Fein leaders. The normal Irish
garrisons outside Dublin would, I presume, remain until
barrack accommodation can be foimd for them elsewhere
and the Free State Government are prepared to dispense
with them. But ostentatious preparations to quit should
be begun everywhere. It is quite possible that in two or
three months very insistent demands will be made for
some of them to stay permanently. This, I fear, we shall
not be able to accede to except as a matter of convenience
for the new Government and for a very limited period. AH
the additional troops in Ireland not accommodated in
permanent peace-time barracks should quit at the very
earliest moment. All troops remaining in Ireland should,
from the date of assumption of of&ce by the Provisional
Government, be moved outside their cantonments and
immediate stations only in accordance with arrangements
agreed upon with the responsible Ministers. They should
act in support of the civil power only on requisitions signed
by the responsible Ministers. The Provisional Government
should be legally authorized to raise forces as may be
necessary in the transition period tmder the Territorial
Forces Act. It is not presumed they will wish to raise
their full quota until they are definitely established. It is,
however, of high importance that there should be at the
earliest moment an Irish force uniformed and disciplined
and capable of supporting the civil power.

(3) Justice. The necessity for Sum Fein Courts will
presumably have disappeared, as all the Courts will become
Free State Courts at the earliest moment. Meanwhile,
however, it is presumed the existing Courts would fimction,
the Viceroy being advised on the exercise of the prerogative
by the Prime Minister or Home- Secretary of the Irish Free
State. The Attorney-General will, it is hoped, explain
how the transition is to be effected in this sphere.

(4) Finance. No alteration whatever at present in the
taxes, nor in the spending of money on the ordinary internal
services of the coimtry. The interceptions which have
lately been in force should of course cease at once, the
fuU sum for Irish internal administration being made
available. . . .

3i6 the world crisis : the aftermath

Funds must also be provided for the raising of the Irish
Free State forces for the maintenance of order.

(5) Education, Agriculture, and internal administrative
services generally. Full responsibility for these should be
placed on the shoulders of a Free State Minister at the
earliest moment.

(6) Measures relating to Indemnity and Amnesty. [Must
be prepared.]

The above notes are on the assumption that the Dail
ratifies the Treaty. It is possible, however, that they may
ratify, but by a majority insufi&ciently large to afford a
lasting basis of settlement. In this case the new Govern-
ment should stiU take office, and should themselves ask
the Viceroy either for a dissolution or for a plebiscite. A
dissolution is infinitely preferable, as it will give a more
responsible Dail. The Viceroy would be guided by the
advice received from the Ministers on this subject, and in
the event of such advice being in favour of a plebiscite,
the necessary machinery must be brought into being by the
Irish Departments, funds being supphed on the authority
of the Treasury in anticipation of Parhamentary sanction.
Pending this appeal to the country, all troops and police
would stand fast as at present, but otherwise the procedure
would be as above, though in a modified form.

A third alternative is the rejection of the Treaty by the
Dail. In this case it is presumed that the Parhament of
Southern Ireland would be dissolved and a General Election
for a new Dail held immediately. We should, however,
before deciding get into touch with the leaders of the rati-
fication party in the existing Dail and ascertain their wishes.
It is presumed' that the Treaty would be re-submitted to
the new Dail as soon as it assembled.’

« * « * *

On January ii I was surprised and glad to receive a
letter from Sir James Craig, who had been for some time
offcially out of touch with His Majesty's Government.
He offered to come to see me at any time when the interests
of Ulster were affected. He added, ‘ I am quite ready to
attend a conference between you and the delegates of
Southern Ireland ... in fact I would welcome an opportu-
nity of meeting Mr. Griffith, or whoever may be charged
with the administration of the Provisional Government, at
an early date, so as to ascertain clearly whether the policy
of Southern Ireland is to be one of peace or whether the

THE IRISH SETTLEMENT

317

present metiiod of pressure on Northern Ireland is to be Craig and
, , j , Collins.

contmuea.

I lost no time in bringing Craig and Michael Collins
together. On January 21 they met in my room at the
Colonial Office, which, despite its enormous size, seemed
overcharged with electricity. They both glowered magni-
ficently, but after a short, commonplace talk I slipped away
upon some excuse and left them together. What these two
Irishmen, separated by such gulfs of religion, sentiment,
and conduct, said to each other I cannot teU. But it took
a long time, and, as I did not wish to disturb them, mutton
chops, etc., were tactfully introduced about one o’clock.

At four o’clock the Private Secretary reported signs of
movement on the All-Ireland front and I ventured to look
in. They annoimced to me complete agreement reduced
to writing. They were to help each other in every way ;
they were to settle outstanding points by personal dis-
cussion ; they were to stand together within the limits
agreed against all disturbers of the peace. We three then
joined in the best of all pledges, to wit, ‘ To try to make
things work.’

Alas, it was not to be so easy. When little more than
a week had passed, Craig had to give reassurance to the
Ulstermen, and Collins back in the Dublin atmosphere
was making violent speeches about the Ulster boundary ;
and the southern boycott of Belfast, which had been ‘ lifted ’
on January 24, was soon resumed in full intensity. Early
in February Sinn Fein raids took place on the Ulster border,
and the simultaneous disturbances which broke out in
Belfast left during a single night thirty dead and seventy
injured in the streets.

It was therefore upon a considerable disappointment
that I had to introduce the Irish Free State Bill implement-
ing the Treaty on February 16. AU the Ulster Members,
with their strong influence throughout the Conservative
Party, openly declared their opposition. Reading the debate
again I see how carefully I had to walk. The general feeling
was that the Treaty was necessary, but would it be observed ?

Had we been hoodwinked, or at the best, had we negotiated
with men of straw ? Had we not given all we had to give

The Irish
Free State
Bill.

318 THE WORLD CRISIS : the aftermath

and received in return only a grimace ? On the other hand,
what else was there to do at the moment ? I had to appeal
to faith, hope and law,

‘ If you want to see Ireland degenerate into a
meaningless welter of lawless chaos and confusion, delay
this BiU. If you wish to see increasingly serious bloodshed
all along the borders of Ulster, delay this BUI. If you
want this House to have on its hands, as it now has, the
responsibility for peace and order in Southern Ireland,
without the means of enforcing it, if you want to impose
those same evil conditions upon the Irish Provisional Govern-
ment, delay this Bill. If you want to enable dangerous
and extreme men, working out schemes of hatred in sub-
terranean secrecy, to tmdermine and overturn a Govern-
ment which is faithfully doing its best to keep its word
with us and enabling us to keep our word with it, delay
this BiU. If you want to proclaim to aU the world, week
after week, that the British Empire can get on just as weU
without law as with it, then you wUl delay this BUI. But
if you wish to give a fair chance to a poUcy to which ParUa-
ment has pledged itself, and to Irish Ministers towards
whom you are bound in good faith so long as they act faith-
fuUy with you to give fair play and a fair chance, if you
wish to see Ireland brought back from the confusion of
tyranny to a reign of law, if you wish to give logical and
coherent effect to the policy and experiment to which we
are committed, you will not impede, even for a single un-
necessary week, the passage of this BiU.' . . .

' Ought we to regret having made the settlement and
signed the Treaty ? ' . . .

‘ Contrast the positions. It appears to me as if the tables
were turned. Ireland, not Britain, is on her trial before
the nations of the world. Six months ago it was we who
had to justify ourselves against every form of attack. Now,
it is the Irish people who, as they teU us, after 700 years
of oppression, have at last an opportunity to show the kind
of government that they can give to their country and the
position whidr they can occupy among the nations of the
world. An enormous improvement in the situation, as I
see it, has been effected in the last six months. Take the
position of Ulster. The position of Ulster is one of great
and unshakeable strength, not only material strength, but
moral strength. There was a time when, as is weU known,
I and others with whom I was then associated thought
that Ulster Mras not securing her own position, but was
barring the way to the rest of Ireland to obtain what th^

THE IRISH SETTLEMENT 319

wanted. Those days are gone. Ulster, by a sacrifice and
by an effort, has definitely stood out of the path of the rest
of Ireland, and claims only those liberties and securities
which are her own, and standing on her own rights, sup-
ported as she is and as she wiU be by the whole force and
power, if necessary, of the British Empire, I am entitled
to say is in a position of great moral and material strength
at the present time.

‘ The position of the Imperial Government has also become
greatly improved. It is very desirable that the great affairs
of th€' British Empire should be increasingly detached from
the terrible curse of this long internal Irish quarrel, and
that the august Imperial authority should stand on a more
impartial plane.’ . . .

The gravamen of the Ulster complaint was the article of
the Treaty which prescribed the future regulation of the
boundcLiy between North and South.

‘ Of course, all this trouble in regard to boundaries sur-
rormds the boundaries of Fermanagh and Tyrone. I remem-
ber on the eve of the Great War we were gathered together
at a Cabinet Meeting in Downing Street, and for a long
time, an hour oiT an hour and a half, after the failure of the
Buckingham Palace Conference, we discussed the boundaries
of Fermanagh and Tjuone. Both of the great pohtical
parties were at eadi other’s throats. The air was full of
talk of civil war. Every effort was made to settle the
matter and bring them together. The differences had been
narrowed down, not merely to the counties of Fermanagh
and Tjnrone, but to parishes and groups inside the areas of
Fermanagh and Tyrone, and yet, even when the differences
had been so narrowed down, the problem appeared to be
as insuperable as ever, and neither side would agree to
reach any conclusion. Then came the Great War. . . .
Every institution, almost, in the world was strained. Great
Empires have been overturned. The whole map of Europe
has been changed. The position of countries has been
violently altered. The mode and thought of men, the
whole outlook on affairs, the grouping of parties, all have
encountered violent and tremendous changes in the deluge
of the world, but as the deluge subsides and the waters f^
we see the dreary steeples of Fermanagh and T5Tone
emerging once again. The integrity of their quarrel is one
of the few institutions that have been unaltered m the cata-
clysm which has swept the world. That says a lot for the
persistency with which Irishmen on the one side or the

The Bound-
ary Ques-
tion.

320 THE WORLD CRISIS : the aftermath

Passap of other are able to pursue their controversies. It says a great
tie Bill. deal for the power which Ireland has, both Nationalist and
Orange, to lay her hands upon the vital strings of British
hfe and politics and to hold, dominate and convulse, year
after year, generation after generation, the politics of this
powerful country. . . .'

I concluded after much argument ; —

‘ Ulster must have British comfort and protection. Ire-
land must have her Treaty, her election, and her constitu-
tion. There will be other and better opportunities of deal-
ing with the difficult boimdary question. . . . For genera-
tions we have been floundering in the Irish bog, but at last
we think that in this Treaty we have set our feet upon a
pathway, which has already become a causeway — ^rather
narrow, but firm and far-reaching. Let us march along this
causeway with determination and circumspection, without
losing heart and without losing faith. If Britain continues
to march forward along that path, the day may come — ^it
may be distant, but it may not be as distant as we expect
— ^when, turning round, Britain will find at her side Ireland
united, a nation and a friend.’

The debate following was worthy of the issue. The
general opinion was well expressed by Mr. Neville Chamber-
lain : —

‘ I, for one, am not going to be exasperated by outrages
into changing my opinion as to the proper course to pursue.
I consider in these difficult times that our business is to
keep our heads, not to allow ourselves to be flustered into
courses we may regret hereafter, but to give aU the powers
that are necessary to enable the Provisional Government
to establish itself securely and to carry out its proper obliga-
tions ; and that in that way we may at any rate save for
ourselves the only hope there is of escaping civil war.’

The majority was overwhelming — 302 to 60. But most
of the majority were miserable and all the minority were
furious.

It took more than a month to pass the Bill. During this
time the dissatisfaction and anxieties of Parliament and
the public were continually fanned by cruel and treacherous
crimes and by the obvious impotence of the only possible
Irish Govemmrait.

THE IRISH SETTLEMENT

321

More serious disturbances bad occurred early in February.
Raids across the Ulster border resulted in the kidnapping
of Northerners. A reinforcement of Northern constabulary,
despatched from Belfast to EnnisMUen, were by an unlucky
forgetfulness of the new frontier sent via Clones in the Free
State, instead of by the longer, safer route through the
Northern territory. On the arrival of the train at Clones
these nineteen men, treated as invaders, were ambuscaded.
Without warning or challenge four were killed, eight
wotmded, and seven captured.

At the same time Mr. Collins flooded me with protests
about the vendettas and counter-vendettas proceeding
nightly in Belfast.

This merciless episode reduced the border to barbaric
conditions. Many other outrages occurred throughout
Ireland ; there would have been more, had it not been
that throughout Southern Ireland not only the loyalists
but the mass of the population subsided abjectly under the
terror. In Belfast a foul kind of warfare was maintained
fiercely by the dregs of both religions.

It was a long way to Tipperary, but at last apparently we
arrived there.

Mr. Churchill to Mr. Cope.^

March 7, 1922.

Personal and. Secret.

Many questions are asked me about Limerick and Tip-
perary. You must let me know what the Provisional
Government are really doing, telling me whether the infor-
mation must be kept secret or not. Do they intend to put
down the Limerick revolt, or are they just going to parley
and continue to be set at defiance ? There are reports in
the papers that Irish troops have been despatched from
DubHn to an unknown . destination. Is this true ? How
many ? Are they to be trusted ? The position in Cork
seems as bad as ever, and it is reported that a notorious
man who had been captured has now escaped. Do you
think there is any fighting quality in the Free State Govern-
ment ? WiU anybody die for it or kill for it ? Let me
know your view, not your wish.

^ Now Sir Alfred Cope, K.C.B. A daring and trustworthy agent
of the British Government who was closely involved in all the Treaty
negotiations and ardent throughout for settlement.

limerick
and. Tip-
perary.

X

Letter to
Mr. Collins.

322 THE WORLD CRISIS : the aftermath

Mr. ChufcMll to Mr. Collins.

March 14, 1922.

Private and Personal.

I have read with attention your letter about the Belfast
outrages in 1920-21. I note that you are going to send
me a statement about more recent events in Belfast. I
send you herewith a report from Sir James Craig with
which he has furnished me in response to your previous
communication of complaints. The state of affairs in Bel-
fast is lamentable. There is an underworld there with
deadly feuds of its own, and only the sternest and strictest
efforts by leading men on both sides, coupled with ample
military and poUce forces, will produce that tranquillity
which is demanded by the interests of Ireland as a whole.

(2) I had long conversations with Sir James Craig before
he returned to Ulster, and I am sure that he will do his
very utmost to maintain order impartially. He has so far
steadily declined to entertain the idea of a further confer-
ence with your Government, on the ground that while you
are illegally holding the Clones men as hostages he cannot
meet you. So here we are at a deadlock for the moment.
I am bound to say that Sir James Craig left me with the
impression that he would be glad to see the obstacles removed
and to have a further parley. I quite see your difficulties,
but I have no doubt whatever that, in spite of them, you
ought to put yourself in the right by either effecting the
release of these men or bringing them to trial in the regular
way on a definite charge before lawfully constituted tri-
bimals. Sir James Craig would be quite satisfied if they
have a fair trial and are dealt with according to law. This
is surely the only line for Heads of Governments to take.
It may be that you do not feel able to do this till the Bill
is through and you are formally equipped with lawful
powers. If so, there is nothing for it but to wait and keep
things as calm and as cool as possible in the interval. This
hostage business is more suited to the Balkans than to
Ireland, and the sooner we get on to a normal footing, the
better.

(3) I am very much obliged to you for having speeded
up the transfer of the necessary staff to the North of Ireland ;
and I hear from Sir John Anderson^ that the administrative
efficiency of your Government is increasing every week,
that the Provisional Ministers axe getting a good grip, and

1 A Civil Servant of the highest rank ; sent to Dublin in 1920 as
Under-Secretary to the Lord-lieutenant and Secretary to the Treasury
for Irdand ; a man of singular capacity and firmness of character,
sagacious and imperturbable amid gathering peril and confusion.

THE IRISH SETTLEMENT 323

are appointing good men as their agents, and that in finance
particularly s3rstems, the soundness of which has been
proved by experience, are being adopted.

(4) I am very glad you are seeing Lord Midleton, repre-
senting the Southern Unionists, to-day ; and I hope you
will be able to reassure him about land purchase. We are
pledged to the hilt to do our part in this matter if the Free
State call upon us to do so, and the advantage accrues
entirely to Ireland as against the larger and more unlucky
island.

(5) I hear from quite an independent source that the
Provisional Government is gaining groimd all over the
country, and that one of the principal supporters of de
Valera has expressed the opinion that they do well if
they get 40. seats in the new Parliament. I hope this is so.

(6) You seem to have liquidated the Limerick situation
in one way or another. No doubt you know your own busi-
ness best, and thank God you have got to manage it and
not we. An adverse decision by the convention of the
Irish Republican Army (so called) would, however, be a
very grave event at the present juncture. I presmne you
are quite sure there is no danger of this.

(7) I read with great interest the full report of the speech
delivered by you in Dublin which Lady Lavery sent me.
I wish it had been reported more fuUy in the EngUsh papers.
I showed it to the Lord Chancellor, who praised its tone
and diction and will possibly quote some passages from it
in his defence of the Free State Bill this week.

(8) I am much interested in your visit to Cork, and
especially in the fact that you appear to have been wel-
comed by the Irish ex-Service men, with whom I S3mipathize
so much. I shall do my best to get a further extension in
regard to Haulbowline [Dockyard] as I am most anxious
that the Cork situation shall adjust itself satisfactorily.

Mr. Churchill to Mr, Collins and Mr. Griffith.

March 31, 1923 .

The whole position on the border is undoubtedly becom-
ing more dangerous. An explosion would be disastrous, and
even a continuance of the present tension tends to stereo-
type the border hne and ma.ke it into a fortified military
frontier, which is the last thing in the world you want. I
cannot think there is the slightest danger of a rciid from the
North into the South. If such a raid took place those
making it would put themselves in the wrong, and the
British Government would take every measure in its power.
I am certain that you do not need to be alarmed on this

Letter to
Mr, Collins.

Rory
O'Connor
seizes the
Four
Courts.

324 THE WORLD CRISIS : the aftermath

score. Even if it happened it would only do harm to those
responsible, just in the same way as the kidnapping raids
from Monaghan have done harm to Southern Irish interests.
I am told that I.R.A. (so called) are collecting along the
border in increasmg numbers. Surely this is not necessary.
Statements also appear in the papers that Free State troops
are stationed at various points. Pray let me know exactly
what is happening.

You must understand that I am at the same time making
the strongest representations to Sir James Craig to prevent
provocative action on the part of his people.

On April 13 a high-souled fanatic, Rory O’Connor, with
a band of adherents and many S3mipathizers seized the
Law Courts in Dublin. In this venerable and massive build-
ing he and his friends proclaimed themselves the Republican
Government of all Ireland. Three days later Michael
Collins was murderously attacked in Dublin. He escaped,
but during the rest of the month the murder of Free State
troops and police continued, diversified by a general railway
strike.

In these pressures a tormented government and its
servants rallied somewhat ; their troops began to fire back,
and even this slight resistance startled their enemies.

Mr. Churchill to Mr. Collins.

April 12, 1922.

On the whole my impression is that public opinion is
increasingly mobilizing and asserting itself in Ireland, and
that you will get very strong national support in defending
your just and lawful position. I have been speaking in
this sense in the House of Commons. I hope that Easter
will not belie these anticipations.

The Cabinet instructed me to send you a formal com-
munication expressing their growing anxiety at the spread
of disorder m the 26 Counties. Instead of this, however,
I write to you as man to man. Many residents are writing
to this country tales of intimidation, disorder, theft and
pillage. There is no doubt that capital is taking flight.
Credits are shutting up, railways are slowing down, business
and enterprise are baffled. The wealth of Ireland is under-
going a woeful shrinkage. Up to a certain point no doubt
these facts may have the beneficial effect of rousing all
classes to defend their own material interests, and Mr. de
Valera may gradually come to personify not a cause but a

THE IRISH SETTLEMENT

325

catastrophe. It is difficult for us over here to measure
truly, but it is obvious that in the long run the Government,
however patient, must assert itself or perish and be replaced
by some other form of control. Surely the moment will come
when you can broadly and boldly appeal not to any clique, sect
or faction, but to the Irish nation as a whole. They surely
have a right to expect you to lead them out of the dark
places, and the opportunity is one [the loss of] which history
win never forgive. Ought you not to rally round the infant
Free State all the elements in Ireland which will whole-
heartedly adhere to the Treaty and sign a declaration
attaching them to it irrespective of what their former atti-
tudes have been ? Would you not find reserves on this
basis infinitely more powerful than any you have obtained
at the present time ? Ought you not to summon your
' far fltmg people to your aid ? In America, Australia,
Canada, New ^aland, there must be hundreds of Irishmen
intensely devoted to the welfare and freedom of their native
land who would come to see fair play over the Elections
and make sure that the people had a free vote.

I am greatly impressed by the courage with which such
large numbers of Irishmen have attended pubHc meetings
to testify to their opinions in spite of so many deterrents,
and I feel at the tips of my fingers the growing national
strength that is behind you, ready for use when the moment
comes for no cause but your own.

I am going into the question of your claim for an Inquiry
into some post-agreement outrages in Belfast. I will have a
talk with Sir James Craig and let you know the result.
Things are settling down to some extent, both in Belfast
and on the frontier, and there is no doubt that the Ulster
Government is making a tremendous effort towards appease-
ment. They will be greatly helped by the release of the
Clones Specials, which I am very glad to see you have
achieved.

I am glad to see you have arranged a meeting with de
Valera ; but I hope you will understand that we cannot go
any further in any respect. We have run every risk and
made every effort and fulfilled every stipulation according
to the agreement we signed with you. But that is the end
absolutely so far as we are concerned, and every one of us
will swing round with every scrap of influence we can com-
mand against a Republic or any inroad upon the Treaty
structure.

It would seem to me also extremely dangerous to allow

^Mr. Collins had used this phrase about the Irish race in con-
versation a few weeks earlier. ‘ We too are a fax-flnng people ’

Further
Letter to
Mr. Collins.

326 THE WORLD CRISIS : the aftermath

Further any farther delay in the Elections to be extorted from you.
letter to Every day that the uncertainty continues must be attended
by the progressive impoverishment of Ireland. Nobody
can invest or make plans for production while the threat
of civil war, or of a Republic followed by a state of war
with the British Empire, hangs over the country. I trust
the end of May or at the very latest the first week in June
will see the issue submitted to the Irish people. We reaUy
have a moral right to ask that the uncertainty as to whether
our offer is accepted or rejected should not be indefinitely
prolonged. ...

Mr. Churchill to Mr. Collins.

April 29, 1922.

It is now three weeks since I wrote to you last, and it
may be well to review a little what has passed in the interval.
First, let me congratulate you and Mr. Griffith on the spirit
and personal courage which you have consistently shown in
confronting the enemies of free speech and fair play. I
have no doubt that the development of strong, bold, roman-
tic personalities at the head of the Irish Provisional Govern-
ment and among the leaders of the Treaty party will be of
real value in the general situation. I also sustain the
impression that the great swing of Irish opinion is increas-
ingly towards the Free State and the Treaty and those
who stand for them ; and that for every manly reason large
munbers of persons will endeavour to assert their political
rights at the poll. From this point of view the delay has
not turned out nearly so badly as we in this country feared.
You have not lost your hold on public opinion ; you have
indeed strengthened it. The excesses of the de Valera fac-
tion and the consequent inconvenience and impoverishment
of Ireland have to a large extent concentrated the discontent,
not upon the Government, but upon its opponents.

I read with very great interest in the Irish papers the
excellent speeches wluch are made and the courageous and
energetic manner in which the Irish Press defends the essen-
tials of social freedom.

Easter is passed without disaster. Your troops are
increasing in numbers and appear to stand to their engage-
ments and obey their officers. . . .

Altogether I see many sober reasons for hope. This
makes me wonder all the more why you adopt such a very
harsh tone in dealing with Sir James Craig. I am sure he
ias made a very great effort to fulfil the agreement in the
lettCT.and in the spirit, and that he is continuously and will
continue striving in that direction. Of course, no one

THE IRISH SETTLEMENT

327

expected that ever3rthing coiild be made right immediately
or that the terrible passions which are loose in Irdand
would not continue to produce their crop of outrages dis-
honouring to the island and its people, and naturally you
have many grounds of complaint against him. He, too, has
furnished me with a long set of counter-complaints, and the
Protestants also have suffered heavily in the recent dis-
turbances. Belfast goods of very great value, running into
millions, have been destroyed, debts owing to Belfast have
been collected illegally and intercepted, and the boycott
I am assured is more injurious in fact than ever before.
Instead of these rough communications, I should have
thought that the Irish leaders. North and South, would
have found it much better to meet together, to take stock
of the position, to record what has been achieved, to mark
what has fallen short in the workmg of the late agreement,
and to decide on new steps to complete its execution.

As I have frequently pointed out, the interest of your
opponents, North and South, Orange or Green ... is to
provoke the worst state of feeling between the two parts
of Ireland; and they would cheerfully welcome every
step and every event which led up to a definite civil war
between the two Governments. Yom opponents in the
North hope to see a Repubhc in the South because it will
bring about inter alia such a civil war, in which they know
they win have the whole force of the British Empire behind
them. Your opponents in the South hope to use antag-
onism against Ulster as a means of enabling them to snatch
the power from the hands of the Provisional Government
or else involve them in a series of events so tragical that
they win break up under the strain. And on both sides
the wreckers dread any approach to the idea of a united
Ireland as the one fatal, final blow at their destructive
schemes. All this seems perfectly simple to me, and I think
these people judge rightly according to their own tactical
view. What I do not understand is why you should let
yomrself be drawn into the quarrel. I know Craig means
to play fair and straight with you, and I do not t hink you
will find such another man in the whole of the North ; and
it perplexes and baffles me when I see you taking up such a
very strong, and even aggressive, attitude against him in
your public utterances. Although perhaps you get some
political advantage for the moment by standing up stiffly
against the North, yet every farthing of that advantage is
drawn and squandered from the treasure chest of Irish
unity. However provoking it may be, I am certain that
your interest and that of the cause you serve demands

Further
Letter to
Mr. Collins.

328 THE WORLD CRISIS : the aftermath

Further
Letter to
Mr. Collins.

patience and- suavity in all that concerns relations with the
North. They are your countr37nien and require from you
at least as careful and diplomatic handling as you bestow
on the extremists who defy you in the South. Moreover,
they are in a very strong, and in fact inexpugnable, posi-
tion ; and they hold in their hands the key to Irish unity.

When you feel moved to anger by some horrible thing
that has happened in Belfast, it may perhaps give you some
idea of our feelings in Great Britain when we read of the
murder of the helpless, disarmed Royal Irish Constabulary
and now, this morning, of what is httle less than a massacre
of Protestants in and near Cork. Twenty Constabulary
men have been shot dead and forty wounded, together with
six or seven soldiers, and now these eight Protestant civilians,
within the jurisdiction of your Government since the Treaty
was signed. All these men were under the safeguard of the
Irish nation and were absolutely protected in honour by
the Treaty. Their blood calls aloud for justice and will
continue to call as the years pass by until some satisfaction
is accorded. As far as I know, not a single person has been
apprehended, much less punished, for any of these cruel
deeds. Yet we on our side have faithfully proceeded step
by step to carry out the Treaty, have loyally done our
utmost to help your Government in every way, and have
not lost confidence in the good faith and goodwill of those
with whom we signed the Treaty. But do not suppose
that deep feelings do not stir on both sides of the Channel.
We, too, are a people not altogether to be treated as negli-
gible in the world. No one can read the history of England
without perceiving how very serious some of these matters
may easily become. It is the business of statesmen not to
let themselves be moved imduly by these feelings, however
deep and natural, but to try as far as possible to steer away
from these dangerous currents and persevere steadily towards
the harbour which they have set out to gain.

At any time when you think it useful to have a further
meeting with Sir James Craig, I will endeavour to bring
it about. I found him reluctant when I addressed him on
the subject this last week, but I know that he sincerely
desires a peaceful, decent and Christian solution.

CHAPTER XVI

THE RISE OF THE IRISH FREE STATE
‘ Tout comprendre, c’est tout pardonmr.’

The Election Compact — Crumbling Foundations — ^Reactions in the
North — ^Letter to Sir James Craig — ^The Whitsuntide Debate —
Patience or Credulity ? Michad Collins — ^Pettigo and Belleek
— ^The Irish Constitution : The Election — ^Murder of Sir
Henry Wilson — Critical Parliamentary Situation — Intervention
of Bonar Law — ^Resolve of the Government — ^Attack

on the Four Courts Decisive Effort — ^Letter to Mr.

Collins — ^Letter to Sir James Craig — ^Deaths of Griffith and
Collins — Cosgrave and O’Higgins — ^The Comer Turned — ^The
Future.

U P tiU the end of April we seemed to be ploughing our
way heavily but surely through all our difficulties.
Ihe Free State Government seemed to be functioning fit-
fully but increasingly, and the Party and Parliamentary
situations in England held. All our hopes and aims were
directed towards the free election by the Irish people of a
representative assembly. There was no doubt whatever
that by an overwhdming majority they were for both the
Treaty and for the Free State Government.

Towards the end of May a new, and to me a most dis-
concerting, development took place. On May 19 Mr.
Griffith had told the Republicans in the Bail that in their
violent courses they did not represent 2 per cent of the
people of Ireland, and that ‘ the course that they were
pursuing placed them on the level of the worst traitors in
Ireland, namely, those who by their actions were rendering
the return of the English troops inevitable.’ The very
next day, to the astonishment of all, to the dismay of their
friends, and to the joy of every enemy, a compact was signed
between de Valera and Michael CoUins. The compact
dealt with the approaching election. It comprised an agree-
ment that the Republican anti-Treaty men (who Mr,

329

The Elec-
tion Com-
pact.

330 THE WORLD CRISIS : the aftermath

Crumbling Griffith had declared the day before did not represent 2

Foundations. people) were to have 57 seats in the

new Parliament as against 64 for the supporters of the
Treaty. They were not to be opposed by the Provisional
Government to the extent of 57 seats. In other words, the
existing balance on the question of accepting or rejecting
the Treaty was to be preserved in the new Parliament and
was not to be disturbed by any contest between members
of the Sinn Fein Party. Secondly, this compact prescribed
that after this so-called election a Coalition Government
should be formed consisting of five pro-Treaty Ministers
and four anti-Treaty Ministers, with the President of the
Assembly and the Minister at the head of the Army addi-
tional. On this basis, the two Sinn Fein parties, pro- and
anti-Treaty, were to divide the representation and challenge
the candidates of every other opinion.

I had received news a few days before of what was in the
wind and I wrote immediately to Michael Collins.

Mr. Churchill to Mr. Collins.

May 15, 1922.

I have received information which leads me to believe
that among the subjects being discussed between you and
the Irregular or Republican party is the proposal that there
should be ‘ an agreed election,' that is to say an election at
which there would be no contests but at which Mr. de Valera
would be accorded 40 seats and the Provisional Government
80. I think I had better let you know at once that any
such arrangement would be received with world-wide
ridicule and reprobation. It would not be an election in
any sense of the word, but simply a farce, were a handful
of men who possess lethal weapons deliberately to dispose
of the political rights of the electors by a deal across the
table. Such an arrangement would not strengthen your
own position in the slightest degree. It would not invest
the Provisional Government with any title to sit in the name
of the Irish nation. It would be an outrage upon demo-
cratic principles and would be universally so denounced.
Your Government would soon find itself regarded as a
tyrannical junta which having got into office by violence
was seeking to maintain itself by a denial of constitutional
rights. The enemies of Ireland have been accustomed to
say that the Irish people did not care about representative
Government, that it was alien to their instincts, and that

THE RISE OF THE IRISH FREE STATE 331

if they had an opportunity they would return to a despotism Crumbling
or oligarchy in one form or another. If you were to allow
yourself to be misled into such an arrangement as is indi- ^
cated, such action would be immediately proclaimed as
justifying to the fuU this sinister prediction. As far as we
are concerned in this country, we should certainly not be
able to regard any such arrangement as a basis on which
we could btuld.

I do earnestly hope that you will put me in a position
to deny these most injurious reports. At any moment
questions may be asked in Parliament on the subject. I
see already that the Daily Chronicle has referred to it in a
leading article.

I beg you will show this letter to Mr. Griffith and to Mr.

Duggan, to whom as co-signatories of the Treaty I am bound
also to address myself.

So we were not, it seemed, to get any foundation after aU.

It was common ground between Republicans and Free-
Staters, regulars and irregulars in the I.R.A., Catholics and
Protestants, landlords and tenants, Unionists and Nation-
alists, from one end of Ireland to the other, that the dominant
wish of the Irish people was to take the Treaty, to work it
honourably, and to restore rmder its aegis the dignity and
prosperity of Irish life. But they were not to be allowed to
express their opinion. The Irish masses, just like the
Russian two or three years before, were not to be allowed
a voice in their fate. They were to be led by the nose, by
a tiny minority making an immoral deal among them-
selves and parcelling out the nation as if they were cattle.

This was more baffling than any of the raids and out-
rages. It threatened to reduce the whole situation to a
meaningless slush.

We were, however, on this issue in possession of the en-
signs of Democracy. Until you get a certain distance down
the slope these coimt for much. We invited the Free State
leaders over to London. They came immediately ; Griffith
plainly in resolute dissent from what had been done ; Collins
half defiant, half obviously embarrassed. It was aU right,
he said ; we did not know their difficulties. These were
hideous and indescribable. Nothing was stable under their
feet. A contested election was physically impossible.

It would mean widespread civil war; no one would

Reactions in
the North.

333 THE WORLD CRISIS: xflE apxermATH

dare to vote ; they had not the strength to keep even
the semblance of order. Nevertheless Collins declared
himself unchanged in general intention to stand by the
Treaty. It looked as if the wounds of Ireland would
not react to any treatment known to science, but would
just slough away into mortification.

These events produced their immediate reaction in the
north. Protestant Ulster was convinced that Southern
Ireland would now sink into chaos, and to wall themselves
off from this infection was the only thought. Incessant
demands were made for troops and arms. Sir James Craig
made an imcompromising statement about the boundary.

Mr. Churchill to Sir James Craig.

May 24, 1922.

Londonderry wiH tell you the results of his discussions
with the War Office and the arrangements which we have
made for the supply of this great mass of material to you.
I must say at once, however, that I do not consider your
declaration made without any reference to the Government
that in no circumstances would you accept any rectification
of the frontier or any Boundary Commission as provided
for in the Treaty is compatible with requests for enormous
financial aid and heavy issues of arms. While I was actually
engaged in procuring the assent of my colleagues to your
requests, you were making a declaration which was in effect
in one passage httle short of a defiance of the Imperial
Government whose aid you seek. Several of my colleagues
have communicated with me this morning in strong protest
against a statement of this kind being made by you when
you are asking for and receiving our assistance and especially
at so critical a moment in Irish affairs. AH I was able to
reply was that de Valera and Collins had made statements
in the Dail yesterday of an equally rmsatisfactory character.
The effect of such a statement on your part is to make it
far more difficult for the Imperial Government to give you
the assistance you need, and also it robs the Ministers who
will meet the Provisional Government representatives of
any effective reproach against Mr. Collins for the contemptu-
ous manner in which he has spoken of the Treaty. It has
enabled many newspapers in England, on whose support
we should have to rely if the worst comes to the worst, to
treat the whole Irish situation on the basis of six of one and
half a dozen of the other. A very strong effort will un-
doubtedly be made in favom of a policy of Britain dis-

THE RISE OF THE IRISH FREE STATE 333

interesting herself entirely in Irish affairs, leaving them ' to letter to
stew in their own juice and fight it out among themselves.’ James
Such a disastrous conclusion is rendered more difficult to
combat by a statement of the kind you have made.

I know you will not mind my speaking quite plainly,
because I am doing my best to support you in all that is
legitimate and legal. We could not have complained, for
instance, if you had said that the CoUins-de Valera agree-
ment rendered aU co-operation between you and the South
impossible. I should have regretted such a statement, but
it was entirely one within your rights to make. But it
is not within your rights to state that you will not submit
to the Treaty which the British Government has signed in
any circumstances, and at the same time to ask the British
Government to bear the overwhelming burden of the whole
of your defensive expenses. I cannot imderstand why it
was not possible to communicate with me before maMng
a declaration in this sense. I should have thought it would
have been quite possible for you to have made a thoroughly
satisfactory declaration to your own people in these critical
times without taking ground which seems to show you just
as ready as Collins or de Valera to defy the Imperial Govern-
ment if they take a course you do not Hke. You ought not
to send us a telegram begging for help on the largest possible
scale and announce an intention to defy the Imperial
Parliament on the same day.

P.S. — I have just received your telegram and am very
glad to know that you are relieved by the decisions which I
have been able to procure on your behalf.

While not by any means giving up hope, I thought it
right to prepare Parliament for a slattern development,
and on the motion for the Whitsuntide adjournment I laid
the whole story before the House of Commons, repeating
the most valid of the explanations which Mr. Collins had
offered.

‘ The Provisional Govenunent could not possibly guar-
antee the ordinary security of life and property if these
securities were challenged by an active, ardent, violent,
Republican minority. This Republican minority, it is
explained, consists mainly of a comparatively small number
of armed men, violent in method, fanatical in temper, but
in many cases disinterested or impersonal in motive. But
behind these, strengthening these, multiplying these, dis-
gracing these, are a larger number of common, sordid
ruffians and brigands, robbing, murdering, pillaging, for

The Whit-
suntide
Debate.

334 THE WORLD CRISIS : the aftermath

their personal gain or for private revenge, or creating
disorder and confusion out of pure love for disorder and
confusion. These bandits — ^for they are nothing else —
pxirsue their devastating course under the so-called glamour
of the Republic and are inextricably intermingled with
bona-fide Republican visionaries.

' The Provisional Government declared that they foimd
themselves unable to deal with these bandits, while at the
same time they were engaged in armed struggles with bona-
fide Republicans. They declared that the Agreement into
which they have entered with the Republicans would isolate
the brigands and would enable these brigands to be struck
at and suppressed, that a greater measure of liberty and
security would inunediately be restored, and that such
conditions are an indispensable preliminary to any free
expression of the political will of the Irish people, to which
they look forward at an early date. They say, further,
that it is in the power of the extreme minority in Ireland,
by murdering British soldiers, or ex-soldiers, or Royal Irish
Constabulary men who have retired from the Constabul-
lary, or Protestants in the South, or by disturbing
Ulster, to produce a series of episodes which, if prolonged
and multiplied would in fact destroy the relationship
between Great Britain and Ireland and render the carrying
through of the Treaty impossible on both sides.’

I urged the House not to underrate this argument. I
added this warning.

‘ Irish Prosperity has been seriously affected. Banking and
business are curtailed ; industry and agriculture are languish-
ing; revenue is only coming in with increasingly laggard
steps ; . . . stagnation and impoverishment are overtaking
the. productive life of Ireland ; the inexorable shadow of
famine is already cast on some of its poorer districts. Will the
lesson be learned in time, and will the remedies be applied
before it is too late ? Or will Ireland, amid the stony
indifference of the world — ^for that is what it would be —
have to wander down those chasms which have already
engulfed the great Russian people ? This is the question
which the next few months will answer.'

I strove against a silent tide of scepticism.

‘ I do not believe that the members of the Provisional
Government are acting in bad faith. I do not believe, as
^ been repeatedly suggested, that they are working hand
in glove with their Republican opponents with the intent

THE RISE OF THE IRISH FREE STATE 335

by an act of treachery to betray British confidence and
Irdand’s good name. I am sure they are not doing that.
They may not have taken the wisest course, or the strongest
course, or the shortest course, but they, and a majority of
Dail Eireann who steadfcistly support them and support the
Treaty are, I sincerely bdieve, animated by an earnest
desire and resolve to carry out the Treaty. Not only Mr.
Giif&th and Mr. CoUins, the two leading men on whose good
faith we took this memorable departure, but the other
Ministers who are in this country, Mr. Cosgrave, Mr. Kevin
O’Higgins and others have repeatedly declared their adher-
ence to the Treaty and have renewed their personal assur-
ances while they have been here with us in the strongest
manner. They have argued vehemently that the course
they are taking — questionable and doubtful as it appears
to British eyes; as it must necessarily appear to almost any
eyes — ^is the surest way, and indeed the only way open to
them of bringing the Treaty into permanent effect. Whether
their policy and methods are right may be questioned.
Whether they wiU succeed or not is open to doubt. But
that they are still trying to do their best to march forward
on that path which alone can save Ireland from hideous
disaster we firmly believe. Some here may think us wrong.
Some here may think we are being deceived and hood-
winked, and by being deceived ourselves are deceiving others.

‘ If we are wrong, if we are deceived, the essential strength
of the Imperial position wiU be in no wise diminished, while
the honour and reputation of Ireland wiU be fataUy aspersed.
Whether you trust or whether you mistrust at this moment,
equaUy you can afford to wait. We have done our part,
we are doing our part with the utmost loyalty before all
the world. We have disbanded our police. We have
withdrawn our armies. We have liberated our prisoners.'
(Here there were scornful interruptions.) ‘Yes, I say it
and I boast it ! We have transferred the powers of govern-
ment and the whole of the revenues of Ireland to the Irish
Ministry responsible to the Irish Parliament. We have
done this on the faith of the Treaty, solemnly signed by
duly accredited plenipotentiaries — ^for such they were — of
the Irish nation, and subsequently endorsed by a majority
of the Irish Parliament. This great act of faith on behalf
of the stronger power wiU not, I believe, be brought to
mockery by the Irish people. If it were, the strength of
the Empire wiU survive the disappointment, but the Irish
name wiU not soon recover from the disgrace.’

Mr. Asquith, my old Chief, rising equally above Party

Patience or
Credulity ?

Michael

Collins.

336 THE WORLD CRISIS : the aftermath

and above passion, threw the whole weight of his authority
upon the side of the Government. Then the House separ-
ated in sombre mood.

On that very day, however, a new incident which I duly
reported to the House had occurred. The townships of
Pettigo and Belleek had been seized and occupied by Irish
Republican forces. Pettigo lay astride the border and
Belleek was wholly in Northern territory. This military
affront brought into play the other side of the dual policy
I was endeavouring to apply. It gave me the opportunity
nf reassuring Ulster that we were not merely sliding with
apologies down the slope, but that whatever else went to
wreck, the integrity of their territory would be protected.
The Secretary of State for War and my other colleagues
on the Cabinet Committee were in full agreement.

Immediately after the debate, Michael Collins, who had •
listened to it, came to my room. I mentioned to him
amicably that if any part of the Irish Republican Army,
either pro-Treaty or anti-Treaty, invaded Northern soil, we
would throw them out. He took it quite coolly, and
seemed much more interested in the debate. ‘ I am glad
to have seen it,’ he said, ‘ and how it is all done over here.

I do not quarrel with your speech ; we have got to make
good or go under.’ We argued a little about Pettigo and
Belleek and about Belfast atrocities. Before he left he
said, ‘ I shall not last long ; my life is forfeit, but I shall do
my best. After I am gone it will be easier for others. You
will find they will be able to do more than I can do.’ I
repeated the phrase of President Brand which I had learned
in the days of the Transvaal Constitution Bill, ' AUes zal
regt kom ’ (All will come right). I never saw him again.

Here I will record a few thoughts about this man, Midhael
Collins. He was an Irish patriot, true and fearless. His
narrow upbringing and his whole early life had filled him with
hatred of England. His hands had touched directly the
springs of terrible deeds. We had hunted him for his life,
and he had slipped half a dozen times through steel claws.
But now he had no hatred of England. Love of Ireland
stUl possessed his soul, but to it was added a wider compre-
hension. He had come in contact during the Treaty

THE RISE OF THE IRISH FREE STATE 337

negotiations with men he liked ; with men who played the Pettigo and
game according to the agreed rules ; he had plighted a new
faith to act fairly by them. As Griffith seemed to rely
especially upon Mr. Austen Chamberlain, so Michael Collins
was deeply impressed by the personahty of Lord Birken-
head. The transition of his sympathies can be followed in
gradations through his speeches by anyone who cares to
study them. Whereas he had had only one loyalty, he
now had two. He was faithful to both ; he died for both.

When in future times the Irish Free State is not only the
home of culture and of virtue, not only prosperous and
happy, but an active, powerful, and annealing force in the
British Commonwealth of Nations, regard will be paid by
widening circles to his life and to his death.

Large bodies of troops, equipped with all the appliances
of war, were now set in motion on the Ulster border. About
7,000 men with cannon and armed launches advanced upon
the villages of Pettigo and Belleek. A demonstration was
made of overwhelming force in support of indefeasible
rights. For more than ten days a British village having
every right to claim protection from the Crown had been
continually in lawless occupation of Irish Republican forces.

After aU, there are occasions when one hundred aggrieved,
armed men are entitled to expel one wrongdoer in his shirt.

The Prime Minister was disquieted by this development.

He feared that we were being manceuvred by the extremists
of both sides into giving battle on the very worst ground.

' If the Free Staters insist upon a constitution which re-
pudiated Crown and Empire and practically set up a Repub-
lic, we should cany the whole world with us in any action
we took ; but an issue fought on Ulster would not command
united British opinion, still less world-wide support. I
understand,' he wrote, ' we are marching against a rotten
barracks at BeUeek garrisoned by a friendly blacksmith
and a handful of his associates . . . but MacKeown [the
blacksmith] is a strong Treaty man and has publicly de-
nounced de Valera and the Pact. If he should be killed
at Belleek it would be a disaster to the cause of reconciliation
with the Irish race. . . .

' Quite frankly, if we force an issue with these facts we

Y

338 THE WORLD CRISIS : the aftermath

Pettigo and shall be hopelessly beaten. There will be a great Die-Hard
shout which will last for a very short time, but we shall have
no opinion behind us that will enable us to carry through a
costly strangling campaign. Let us keep on the high
ground of the Treaty, the Crown, the Empire. There we
are unassailable. But if you come down from those heights
and fight in the swamps of Lough Erne you will be over-
whelmed. You have conducted these negotiations with
such skiU and patience that I beg you not to be tempted
into squandering what you have already gained by a precipi-
tate action, however alluring the prospects may be.'

Mf. Churchill to the Prime Minister.

I was in train of answering your letter when it was
superseded by events. Belleek "^age and fort were occupied
to-day by strong forces. Pursuant to our orders the village
was reconnoitred first by an armoured car, and not until
this reconnaissance had been fired upon while in Ulster
territory and from points in Ulster territory did the troops
advance. About 20 shell and 400 rounds were fired. On
one shell bursting near the fort its garrison of 40 fled without
loss of any kind. The blacksmith to whom you refer had
not left Dublin according to Mr. Griffith. As far as we
know the ' battle ’ has been almost bloodless. One soldier
has been slightly wounded and no enemy casualties have
been found or prisoners taken. I am issuing a communique
explaining that the operations are at an end, that our troops
will advance no further, that no further fighting wiH take
place unless they axe attacked, that communications are
being made to the Provisional Government with a view to
establishing peaceful conditions on this part of the border,
and that as soon as we are assured there will be no further
incursions, the British forces will be withdrawn wholly
within the Ulster border-line.

It is always difficult to deal with a small urgent local
situation without compromising grave general issues, but I
do not think the action taken will have evil results. I hope,
indeed, it may have had good results and I am quite sure
that we could not have met the House of Commons on
Monday with the admission that we did not know what
was going on in a British village and did not dare go there
to find out.

The results of this operation which threaded its way so
narrowly between tragedy and ridicule were salutary.

THE RISE OF THE IRISH FREE STATE 339

Ulster felt that if it came to actual invasion they would
certainly be defended. The Irish Republican Army realized tion The
that we should not hesitate to levy open war, and the Free Election.
State Government knew that at any rate one line was
drawn whidi could not be transgressed. Not the slightest
ill will was manifested by those Free State leaders with
whom we were in relation. On the contrary, they seemed
fortified in spirit for the very serious crisis which was soon
to supervene.

Meanwhile the terms of the Irish Constitution were beiag
worked out in detail by the Provisional Government in
Dublin. There had been many suggestions, open and covert,
that the Constitution would not be within the four walls
of the Treaty. Extremists in Ireland looked forward to it
as likely to provide the occasion for a breach. In England
everyone was at his limit and the fires of wrath were double-
banked. Fortunately, though not without hard words and
much argument, an instrument which both parties were able
to accept was produced and the apostles of violence were
once more disappointed. The text of the Irish Free State
Constitution was issued on June 15, and the next day the
electors of Southern Ireland went to the poll. In spite of the
farcical and indecent compact and the absurdities of propor-
tional representation, the voting for the Treaty was heavy.

The figures were : Pro-Treaty Sinn Fein, 58 ; Republicans,

36 ; Labour, 17 ; Farmers, 7 ; Independents, 6 ; and
Unionists, 4. On a plain issue and a free vote hardly any
of the opponents of the Treaty would have been returned.

The result was masked and confused by the compact, and
no sure foundation was established. Nevertheless the form
of the Constitution to which the Free State leaders had
agreed, was such as to preclude Mr. de Valera and his
followers from sharing in the Government. A pernicious
duality in the Executive was thus avoided.

A few days later a resounding crime was perpetrated.

Sir Henry Wilson, after completing his term as Chief of
the Imperial General Staff, had been elected a Member
of Parliament for an Ulster constituency. It had also
been freely stated in the newspapers that he would act
as the military adviser of the Ulster forces. He had

340 THE WORLD CRISIS : the aftermath

Murder of not, in fact, taken any part in their executive affairs.

WiiSn!^ Two Irishmen living in London, one of them a messenger

in a Government office, regarding him as the commander
of the hostile army and personally responsible for the
murders in Belfast, waylaid him on his doorstep in Eaton
Square and shot him to death with their pistols at three
o’clock on the afternoon of June 22. He had just returned
from the unveiling of a War Memorial and was in the khaki
uniform of a Field-Marshal. He fell, pierced by ntuner-
ous bullets, on the doorstep of his home. The murderers
took to flight, but every hmnan being on the spot, although
unarmed, spontaneously pursued them. They retreated
for some distance, firing at the gathering crowds. However,
there was no escape. Everyone rushed upon them from
all sides. They were seized and hurried to gaol to await
the certain and speedy doom of British law. The effect
of this murder in the heart of London of a man renowned
throughout Europe as a strategist, and also of a Member
of the House of Commons, was profound. The murderers
do not seem, according to our present knowledge, to have
been directed by any Irish organization. They exploded
independently; but Great Britain reacted with the same
sudden anger as had followed the murders in the Phoenix
Park nearly forty years before. The late Field-Marshal
was carried to his grave on the following Monday with the
highest military honours. All the way to St. Paul’s Cathe-
dral dense crowds thronged the streets. I had to face
the House of Commons in the afternoon.

I had thought out most carefully the arguments to use,
and in spite of the intensity of feeling I was allowed to
unfold them fully. I surveyed with extreme plainness
the good and bad points in the Irish situation. I paid a
tribute to the memory of Sir Henry Wilson, the substance
of which is embodied in the third volume of this account.
I described the growing strength of the Ulster Government,
and our plans for placing a complete cordon of Imperial
troops across Ireland to separate the north from the south.
I dwelt upon the will of the Irish people as manifested by
the election. But all of this would have been futile apart
from the following ; —

THE RISE OF THE IRISH FREE STATE 341

‘ I should not be dealing honestly and fully ■with this Critical
subject if I left in the minds of the House the impression
that all that is required is patience and composure. No, Sir. situatSn.
Firmness is needed in the interests of peace as much as
patience. The constitution which we have seen, which has
been pubhshed, satisfactorily conforms to the Treaty. It has
now to be passed through the new Irish Parliament. There is
no room for the shghtest diminution of the Imperial and
Constitutional safeguards and stipulations which it contains.

That is not aU. Mere paper affirmations, however important,
unaccompanied by any effective effort to bring them into
action, will not be sufficient. Mere denunciations of
murder, however heartfelt, unaccompanied by the appre-
hension of a single murderer, cannot be accepted. The
keeping in being ■within the Irish Free State by an elaborate
process of duahty, merging upon dupHcity, of the whole
apparatus of a Republican Government ■will not be in
accordance either ■with the ■will of the Irish people, ■with
■the stipulations of the Treaty, or ■with ■the maintenance of
good relations between the two countries. The resources
at the disposal of His Majesty’s Government are various
and powerful. There are military, economic, and financial
sanctions — ^to use a word with which we frequently meet in
Continental affairs — ^thereare sanctions of these kinds which
are available, and which are formidable. They have been
very closely studied, and the more dosdy they are studied the
more clearly it is seen that those measures ■will be increas-
ingly effective in proportion as the Irish Government and
State become more fully and more solidly organized. ■ . . .

‘ Hitherto we have been dealing ■with a Government
weak because it had formed no contact ■with the people.

Hitherto we have been anxious to do nothing to com-
promise the clear expression of Irish opinion. But now
this Pro'visional Government is greatly strengthened. It
is armed with the declared ■will of the Irish electorate.

It is supported by an effective Parliamentary majority.

It is its duty to give effect to the Treaty in the letter and
in the spirit, to give full effect to it, and to give full effect
to it "without d^elay. A much stricter reckoning must
rule henceforward. The ambiguous position of the so-
called Irish Repubhcan Army, intermingled as it is with
the Free State troops, is an affront to the Treaty. The
presence in Dublin, in violent occupation of the Four
Courts, of a band of men styling themselves the Head-
quarters of the Republican Executive, is a gross breach
and defiance of the Treaty. From this nest of anarchy
and treason, not only to the British Cro^wn, but to the

342 THE WORLD CRISIS : the aftermath

Intervention Iridi people, murderous outrages are stimulated and encour-

Bon^ Law ^ twenty-six Counties, not only in the

territory of the Northern Government, but even, it seems
most probable, here across the Channel in Great Britain.
From this centre, at any rate, an organization is kept in
being which has branches in Ulster, in Scotland, and in
England, with the declared purpose of wrecking the Treaty
by the vilest processes which humeiiP degradation can con-
ceive. The time has come when it is not unfair, not prema-
ture, and not impatient for us to make to this strengthened
Irish Government and new Irish Parliament a request,
in express terms, that this sort of thing must come to an
end. If either from weakness, from want of courage, or for
some other even less creditable reasons, it is not brought
to an end and a very speedy end, then it is my duty to
say, on behalf of His Majesty’s Government, that we shall
regard the Treaty as having been formally violated, that we
shall take no steps to carry out or to legalize its further
stages, and that we shall resume full liberty of action in any
direction that may seem proper and to any extent that may
be necessary to safeguard the interests and the rights that
are entrusted to our care.’

The subsequent debate was marked by the intervention
of Mr. Bonar Law, who had retired from the Government
and from the leadership of the Conservative party m April
1921, whose health was now restored, and whose political
influence was a factor of first importance.

‘ The Colonial Secretary ... at the end of his speech
did everything which I would say you could ask the Govern-
ment to do, or any Government to do to-day. . . . His
attention was called to what is happening in the Four
Courts. I do not think anyone could have read the letter
issued from that quarter without the same feeling of abhor-
rence .as was expressed by the Colonial Secretary ; but
there was something else in it more hkely than an3d;hing
to arouse our horror. The reference to Sir Henry
Wilson’s death in which they said they did not do it,
clearly implied that they foimd no fault with it. . . .
Just think of this. . . . There is in Dublin a body
which has seized the Four Courts — to make the irony
more complete it is the centre of justice in Ireland — and
from these Four Courts, undoubtedly, emissaries are going
out, tr3dng to carry out in Ulster precisely the same methods
which they think succeeded in the South, and are instigating
murder in eveiy direction. Is that tolerable for a moment ?
Let the Committee think what it means. Suppose we found

THE RISE OF THE IRISH FREE STATE 343

out that there was a body occupj^g an important position Resolve of
ia Paris, which was openly subsidizing murderers to come to meiit°^*™
this country and upset our Government. What would
happen ? We should not make representations in Paris, and
say, “ We must make sure you do not approve of it.” We
should say, " You must stop this or there is war.” Are
we to be in a different position, in that respect, towards
what appears to me to be one of our own Dominions ?

... I do not think there is any man in this House . . .
who does not realize what a terrible thing it would be if
we were reduced again to try to secure order in Southern
Ireland by that means. . . . Now the position is dear.

Much time cannot elapse before these grave matters — to
quote a sa3dngof the Colonial Secretary — are brought to the
test. I for one say that I believe the Government means to
see this through, but if they do not, I will be against them, and
I hope the House of Commons will be against them also.’

Later in the evening the Prime Minister and I met
Mr. Bonar Law in the Lobby. Although always holding
himself in Strict restraint, he manifested an intense passion.

As far as I can remember he said, ‘ You have disarmed
us to-day. If you act up to your words, well and good,

but if not ! ! ’ Here by an obvious effort he pulled

himself up and walked away from us abruptly.

The Cabinet, supported by the House of Commons,
were resolved that whatever happened Rory O’Coimor
must be put out of the Four Courts. The only question
was when and how ; and this must be promptly settled.

Orders were actually sent to General Macready. However
this officer prudently, and as it turned out fortunately,
counselled delay : and at this darkest hour in Ireland came
daybreak. On June 27 Rory O’Cormor’s band, ranging
cheerfully through the streets of Dublin, kidnapped General
O’CoimeU, Commander-in-Chief of the Free State Army.

Michael Collins, under the pressure of this event, and having
doubtless learned that if he did not march, we would,
determined to attack the Four Courts at dawn. All
authority in Dublin was quaking, but he had his own
following among the I.R.A. He asked for the loan of two
eighteen-pounder guns from General Macready, and upon
instructions from London these were delivered. He had
one capable, resolute officer, Dalton by name, who had

Attack on
the Four
Courts.

344 THE WORLD CRISIS : the aftermath

seen mudi service in France. This man fetched the gnns
from the British camp, and working them with, his own
hands and half a dozen untrained men, opened fire at
4 a.m. on June 28. Then followed one of those comic-
tragic conflicts which were characteristic of the Free State
Civil War, Both sides loved and respected each other as
dear comrades in arms ; both, were ready to die if it could
not possibly be avoided, but much more ready to expend
ammunition than blood. Lavish rifle fire directed at the
walls of buildings broke out, interspersed by expostulations
and appeals to the higher nature of man. Commandant
Dalton, half of whose gunners were woxmded, continued
to hurl shell into the Four Courts, and this cannonade was
in fact the salute which celebrated the foundation of the
Irish Free State.

Two more guns were asked for and supplied during the
afternoon, and by evening all the ammunition, modestly
hmited to 200 rounds, was exhausted. It is surprising that
at this crisis General Macready, who had so often shown
good sense and comprehension, should have professed him-
self unable to supply any more. The Provisional Govern-
ment were told they must wait until a destroyer from
Carrickfergus could arrive with further supplies of high-
explosive shells. On receiving this news, they very nearly
collapsed. Frantic appeals and threats were made to me
that night over the telephone, and every resource was used
to hasten the supply. It appeared however that the
Commander-in-Chief was unwilling to encroach even for a
few hours upon the ample supplies of his defended camp.
Two or three hundred rounds would have been ample. His
sixteen batteries had nearly 10,000 shells of various natures
of which half were high explosive.

On the 30th, the Free Staters having with great circum-
spection gained a footing in a portion of the Foiur Courts,
Rory O’Connor set it on fire and after an explosion, which
caused some loss of life, surrendered with his followers. A
mass of papers of legal importance and of historical interest,
some of them dating from the thirteenth centTxry, were
destroyed, and the dome of the building collapsed amid
its ruins. Fighting wait on for several da3rs in Sackville

THE RISE OF THE IRISH FREE STATE 345

Street and became fiercer as it progressed ; but by July 5
all rebels actually in arms against the Provisional Govern-
ment had surrendered.

This week’s fighting was the decisive event in the birth
struggles of the Irish Free State. When reduced to the
last gasp that infant organism had reacted timorously but
violently, and had gained new strength with every effort.
A hard line was now drawn between friend and foe, and
mortal hatreds were exdianged. The Provisional Govern-
ment, menaced by imminent assassination, fortified them-
selves under trusty guards in Merrion Square. They
lived together for some weeks without ever returning
to their homes. Mr. Kevin O’Higgins told me some years
later how some of them sat one evening in an angle of the
roof for a little fresh air ; how in lighting a cigarette he
inadvertently raised himself for a few moments above the
parapet, and how the bullet from a neighbouring house
cut the cigarette from his fingers. But these men, although
deeply troubled in their souls, were courageous and hot-
blooded ; and driven as they had been into a comer with
their lives at stake — and far more than their lives, the
cause they had conducted so far — ^they hit back with
primordial freedom. On July la they issued a proclama-
tion threatening drastic reprisals against all attempts
at murder; they nominated a War Council under Michael
Collins, and set on foot active aggressive operations against
their enemies all over Ireland. Thus began the Free
State Civil War. It was a very curious war, conducted
by a few people who knew each other extremely well ;
who knew where to find each other and what the other man
was likely to do in given drciunstances. Collins and his
adherents set to work to hunt down and kill those who
they knew were compassing their destruction. In this
guerilla most of the best-known gunmen lost their lives.

Mr. Churchill to Mr. Collins.

Private and Personal.

July 7, 1922.

I have not troubled you during these anxious da3re and
have confined my messages to your practical requirements.
But the events which have taken place since you opened

A Decisive
Effort.

346 THE WORLD CRISIS : the aftermath

Letter to fire on the Four Courts seem to me to have in them the

Mr. Collins, possibilities of Very great hope for the peace and ultimate
unity of Ireland, objects both of which are very dear to
your British co-signatories. I feel this has been a terrible
ordeal for you and your colleagues, having regard to aU
that has happened in the past. But I believe that the
action you have taken with so much resolution and coolness
was indispensable if Ireland was to be saved from anarchy
and the Treaty from destruction. We had reached the end
of our tether over here at the same time as you had in
Ireland. I could not have sustained another debate in
the House of Commons on the old lines without fatal conse-
quences to the existing governing instrument in Britain,
and with us the Treaty would have fallen too. Now aU is
changed. Ireland will be mistress in her own house, and
we over here are in a position to safeguard your Treaty
rights and further your legitimate interests effectually.

As soon as you have established the authority of the
Irish Free State throughout the 26 Counties, as I do not
doubt you will in a short time, and have placed yourself
and your colleagues at the head of the great mass of the
Irish nation, a new phase wiU begin far more hopeful than
any we have hitherto experienced. In this phase the
objective must be the unity of Ireland. How and when
this can be achieved I cannot tell, but it is surely the goal
towards which we must aU look steadfastly. There wiU
be tremendous difficulties, vexations and repulses, and no
doubt any premature hope wiU be disappointed. But I
have a strong feeling that the top of the hiU has been
reached, and that we shall find the road easier in the future
than in the past. We must endeavour to use the new
strength and advantages which are available to secure
broad solutions. Minor irritations, however justifiable,
must not be allowed to obstruct us or lead us off the
track. Craig and Londonderry are coming over here on
the 13th. I have not worried them with the various
complaints, some of which are rmdoubtedly justified, con-
tained in your letter of the 28th June. The Viceroy has
reserved the BiU abolishing Proportional Representation in
the North for the Royal Assent, which means that we shall
have time to talk it aU over. Otherwise I wish to keep the
ground clear in the hopes of a general return at the right
moment to the governing idea of the CoUins-Craig pact.
You remember how Mr. Griffith wrote it all over the blotting
pad in my room. There is the key to the new situation.
We must wait till the right moment comes and not fritter
away growing advantages by premature efforts. I wUl

THE RISE OF THE IRISH FREE STATE 347

write to you after I have seen Craig and Londonderry
again. I think I can get a better result in friendly conver-
sation about your various complaints than by nagging them
in official correspondence.

Meanwhile, in the intervals of grappling with revolt and
revolution, I think you should turn over in your mind what
would be the greatest ofier the South could make for Northern
co-operation. Of course, from the Imperial point of view
there is nothing we should like better than to see North
and South join hands in an all-Ireland assembly without
prejudice to the existing rights of either. Such ideas would
be vehemently denormced in many quarters at the moment,
but events in the history of nations sometimes move very
quickly. The Union of South Africa, for instance, was
achieved on a wave of impulse. The prize is so great that
other things should be subordinated to gaining it. The
bulk of people are slow to take in what is happening, and
prejudices die hard. Plain folk must have time to take
things in and adjust their minds to what has happened.
Even a month or two may produce enormous changes in
public opinion.

Please give my good wishes to Mr. Griffith and show him
this letter if you will.

P.S. I hope you are taking good care of yourself and
your coUeagues. The times are very dangerous.

Mr. Churchill to Sir James Craig.

Private and Personal.

July 7, 1922.

Very great events have taken place in Southern Ireland
since we last met, and I am sure you will have been ponder-
ing over their consequences. The framing of a satisfactory
Constitution for the Irish Free State ; the clear wish of
the Irish people recorded at the polls in spite of so many
difficulties ; the determined suppression by force of arms
of the Republicans in Dublin and the campaign against
them now being launched all over the country, particularly
in Donegal; and lastly, the appeal made to Irishmen
generally to come forward in support of the Government
— ^all these constitute a series of stepping-stones towards a
far better state of affairs than we had any right to hope
for a few weeks ago.

I know you and Charlie^ will be on the look out on your
side for an3rthing that can turn these favourable events to
the general and lasting profit of Ireland and of the Empire.
We want quiet and we want time, in order that the new
1 Lord Londonderry.

Letter to
Sir James
Craig.

348 THE WORLD CRISIS : the aftermath

Deaths of situation may sink into people’s minds and in order that
the superior solutions which may now be possible may
occur naturally to many people.

I see all your difficulties over the Boundary Commission,
and as you know we have on two occasions got Collins to
agree to alternative methods of procedure. It may well be
that after he has won his fight in the South he wiU be in
a position to make you a much broader offer which wiU
render the intervention of the Boundary Commission un-
necessary, and which will secure the effective co-operation
in your Government of all the best of the Cathohc elements
in Ulster. Meanwhile I trust you will not have to make
any references to the subject of the Boundary Commission
which might suggest the possibility of a conflict between
you and H.M. Government. We really have got to work
these things out together, and I feel increasingly hopeful
that we shall succeed.

I do not want to hurry you in any way, and I feel that
we must see quite clearly what the results of the fighting
in the South are going to be. It may carry the Provisional
Government very far. Once the position is appreciated and
forces are raised with definite aims and principles, people's
minds are changed very much : a gulf opens between them
and their past. I always hve in hopes that we may come
back again to your suggestion of the Craig-CoUins pact to
stand together and settle aU the outstanding issues in accord.
This seems to me to be all the more possible now that you
seem to be getting increasing control of the situation in
Ulster and now that Collins has definitely drawn the sword.

I do not bother you with minor matters in this letter,
although there are several outstanding which cause me
anxiety. These we can discuss when we meet, but I feel
that we must be on the look out for an opportunity to
deal with the situation on mudh broader lines than have
hitherto been possible.

Death was soon to lay its hands upon the two principal
signatories of the Irish Treaty. Arthur Griffith died of
heart failure, so it is established, on August 13, and Collins
himself, moving audaciously about the country rall3ang
and leading his supporters in every foray, was killed in an
ambush on August 22. The presentiment of death had
been strong upon him for some days, and he only narrowly
escaped several murderous traps. He sent me a valedictory
message through a friend for which I am grateful. ‘ Tell
Winston we could never have done an3^thing without him.’

THE RISE OF THE IRISH FREE STATE 349

His funeral was dignified by the solemn ritual of the Roman
Catholic Church and by every manifestation of public sorrow.
Then Silence. But his work was done. Successor to a
sinister inheritance, reared among fierce conditions and
moving through ferocious times, he supplied those qualities
of action and personality without which the foundation of
Irish nationhood would not have been re-established.

The void left by the deaths of GrifS.th and Collins was
not unfilled. A quiet, potent figure stood in the back-
grotmd sharing, like Grifiith, the dangers of the rebel leaders
without taking part in all that they had done. In Cosgrave
the Irish people found a chief of higher quality than any
who had yet appeared. To the courage of Collins he added
the matter-of-fact fidelity of Griffith and a knowledge of
practical administration and state pohcy all his own. At
his side rose the youthful Kevin O’Higgins, a figure out of
antiquity cast in bronze.

These men restored order in Ireland by ancient methods
and with no great effusion of blood. The people in their
turmoil, confusion, and distress felt the stimulus of a will-
power calm, intense, and ruthless. The attempt to break
down the Dail by murdering its Members individually was
countered in the following way. On two Deputies being
shot almost on the steps of the Parliament House, Rory
O’Connor and three of his leading associates were awakened
and shot without trial on a December morning. They had
been residing in easy confinement in Motmtjoy Prison since
their surrender at the Four Courts. They met their fate
with equal astonishment and fortitude. A year before
Rory O’Connor had been best man at the wedding of Kevin
O'Higgins. It is evident that those who judge these events
in future time will have to do so with comprehension of the
stresses and strange conditions of this period of convulsion.

Mr. ChurchiU to Mr. Cope.

August 23.

Following for Cosgrave, Duggan and the Provisional
Government : —

I take the earliest opportunity in this hour of tragedy
for Ireland and of intense difficulty for the Irish Provisional
Government of assuring you of the confidence which is felt

Cosgrave

and

O’Higgins.

The Corner
Turned.

350 THE WORLD CRISIS : the aftermath

by the British Government that the Treaty position will
be faithfully and resolutely maintained. The death of the
two principal signatories, the retirement of another and
the desertion of a fourth, in no way affects the validity and
sanctity of the settlement entered into with the plenipoten-
tiaries of the Irish nation. On the contrary we are sure
that the Provisional Government and the Irish people will
feel it all the more a sacred duty to carry into fuU effect
the act of reconciliation between the two islands which
was the life-work of the dead Irish leaders, and with which
their names will be imperishably associated. For our part
the word of Britain has been passed and is inviolable. We
hold ourselves bound on the Treaty basis and will meet
good faith with good faith and goodwill with goodwill to
the end. You, as acting Chairman of the Provisional
Government, and your civil colleagues and your high military
officers, may count on the fullest measure of co-operation
and support from us in any way that is required.

Another man of distinction, ability and courage fell a
victim. Erskine Childers, author of The Riddle of the
Sands, who had shown daring and ardour against the
Germans in the Cuxhaven raid of New Year’s Day 1915,
had espoused the Irish cause with even more than Irish
irreconcilability. He, too, was shot for rebellion against
the Free State. Said Kevin O’Higgins in public, with
severity, ‘ If Englishmen come to Ireland looking for
excitement, we will see that they get it.’ He died with the
utmost composmre. Kevin O’Higgins himself was also in
after years to fall by the bullet.

Before these closing tragedies I had ceased to be connected
with Anglo-Irish affairs ; but when the Coalition Govern-
ment resigned at the end of October 1922, the strength
and power of the Irish Free State was firmly erected upon
the basis of the Treaty. One of the first decisions of Mr.
Bonar Law’s Cabinet was that the Treaty should be made
good in letter and in spirit ; and this has guided aU later
British Administrations. Who cares to predict the future ?
Britain is free and Ireland is lonely. Ireland is poor, and
Britain is still ploughing through the sombre consequences
of Armageddon. Ireland as a Dominion within the British
Commonwealth of Nations has much to give to her neigh-
bour and much to withhold from her. No one can expect

351

The

Future.

352 THE WORLD CRISIS : the aftermath

that the hatred and prejudices of centuries will pass away
in the passage of our short lives. But that they will pass
away in the merciful oblivion of time and in the recuperative
fruitfulness of nature seems to be a good and fair hope.
Fifty years of peaceful association and new growth must
bring the study of common interests increasingly into
prominence. In the imdying words of Grattan : ' The
Channel forbids union; the Ocean forbids separation.’
Two ancient races, founders in great measure of the British
Empire and of the United States, intermingled in a thousand
ways across the world, and with the old cause of quarrel
ended, must gradually try to help and not to harm each
other. It may well be that a reward is appointed for all and
that an Ireland reconciled within itself and to Great Britain
will on some high occasion claim to guide the onward march,
and offer to the British Empire and perhaps to the English-
speaking world solutions for our problems otherwise beyond
our reach.

CHAPTER XVII

TURKEY ALIVE

‘ Vote it as you please. There is a company of poor
men who will shed, their last drop of blood, before they see
it settled so*

— Oliver Cromwell.

Turkey before the Wax — ^The Offer of the Allies — ^The Pan-Turks —
— ^Enver — German-Turkish Plans — ^The Requisition of the
Turkish Battleships — The Goeben — ^Enver’s Coup d'&fat: The
Final Crash — ^Aiter the Armistice — ^American Criticism — ^Presi-
dent Wilson’s Commission — ^Insurgence and Paralysis — K Deadly
Step — The Greek Descent on Smyrna — ^Turkey Alive — Justice
changes Camps — K New Turning-point — ^Headlines — ^Ferid — ^The
Melting of the Armies — Restrictions and Illusions — ^Talks about
Constantinople — Cabinet Decision — ^The Treaty of Sdvres — ^The
March of Facts — Attack on the Ismid Peninsula — ^My Letter
of March 24.

N O State plunged into the World War so wilfully as
Turkey.'- The Ottoman Empire was in 1914 already
moribund. Italy, using sea power, had invaded and annexed
Tripoli in 1909, and a desultory warfare was still proceeding
in the interior of this province, when the Balkan States
in 191a drew the sword upon their ancient conqueror
and tyrant. Important provinces and many islands were
ceded by the defeated Turkish Empire in the Treaty of
London, and the division of the spoils became a new cause
of bloodshed among the Balkan victors. Rich prizes still
remained in European Turkey to tempt the ambition or
satisfy the claims of Roumania, Bulgaria, Serbia and Greece ;
and through all Constantinople glittered as the supreme
goal. But imminent as were the dangers of the Turkish
Empire from the vengeance and ambition of the Balkan
States, nothing could supplant in the Turkish mind the

1 See map of Turkey to face page 438.

353 Z

Turkey
before the
War.

The Offer
of the
Allies.

354 THE WORLD CRISIS : the aftermath

fear of Russia. Russia was in contact with Turkey by
lantil and water along a thousand-mile frontier which
stretched from the western shores of the Black Sea to the
Caspian. England, France and Italy (Sardinia) in the
Crimean War, the exceptional power of England under
Disraeh in 1878, had preserved the Turkish Empire from
ruin and Constantinople from conquest. Although before
the Balkan AUies quarrelled among themselves, the Bul-
garians had marched to the gates of Constantinople from
the West, the sense of peril from the North still outweighed
all else in Turkish thoughts.

To this was added the antagonism of the Arab race in the
Yemen, the Hedjaz, Palestine, S37ria, Mosul, and Iraq. The
population of Kurdistan and the widely distributed Armenian
race were estranged. From every quarter the nations
and races who for five or six hundred years had waged
war against the Turkish Empire or had suffered the fate
of Turkish captives, turned their gaze in a measureless
hatred and hunger upon the dying Empire from which
they had endured so much so long. The hour of retribu-
tion and restoration was at hand ; and the only doubt
was how long could the busily spun webs of European
diplomacy, and particularly of English diplomacy, postpone
the final reckoning. The imminent collapse of the Turkish
Empire, like the progressive decay and disruption of the
Austrian Empire, arising from forces beyond hrunan control,
had loosened the whole foundations of Eastern and South-
Eastern Europe. Change — ^violent, vast, incalculable, but
irresistible and near, brooded over the hearths and institu-
tions of 120 millions of people.

It was at this hour and on this scene that Germany had
launched her army to the invasion of France through
Belgium, and all other quarrels had re-aligned themselves
in accordance with the supreme struggle. What was to
happen to scandalous, crumbling, decrepit and penniless
Turkey in this earthquake ?

She received what seemed to British eyes the most favour-
able offer ever made to any government in history. She was
guaranteed at the price merely of maintaining her neutrality
the absolute integrity of all her dominions. She was

TURKEY ALIVE

355

guaranteed this upon the authority not only of her friends,
France and Britain, but on that of her enemy, Russia.
The guarantee of France and England would have pro-
tected Turkey from the Balkan States, and especially
Greece ; the guarantee of Russia suspended to indefinite
periods the overhanging menace firom the North. The
influence of Britain could largely allay and certainly post-
pone the long rising movement of the Arabs. Never,
thought the Allies, was a fairer proposition made to a
weaker and more imperilled State.

But there was another side to the picture. Within the
decaying fabric of the Turkish Empire and beneath the
surface of its political affairs lay fierce, purposeful, forces
both in men and ideas. The disaster of the first Balkan
War created from these elements a concealed, slow-burning
fire of strange intensity unrealized by all the Embassies
along the shores of the Bosphorus — ^aU save one. ‘ During
this time ’ (the years before the Great War), wrote a pro-
foundly informed Turk in 1915, ‘ the whole future of the
Turkish people was examined by Committees down to the
smallest details.' ^

The Pan-Tturk Committee accepted the Anglo-Russian
Convention of 1907 as a definite alliance between the Power
who had been Turkey’s strongest and most disinterested
supporter and friend with the Power who was her ancient
and inexorable enemy. They therefore looked elsewhere
for help in the general European war which they were con-
vinced was approaching. Their plan, which seemed in
1913 merely visionary, was based upon the re-creation of
Turkey on a solely Turkish human foundation; to wit,
the Turkish peasantry of Anatolia. It contemplated as a
national ideal the uniting of the Moslem areas of Caucasia,
the Persian province of Azerbaijan, and the Turkish Trans-
Caspian provinces of Russia (the homeland of the Turkish
race) with the Turks of the Anatolian peninsula; and the
extension of Turkey into the Caspian Basin. It included
the rejection of theocratic government ; a radical change
of relationship between Church and State ; the diversion

1 Tiwkish and Pan-Turkish Ideals, by ' Tekin Alp.' First pub-
lished in German, 1915.

The Pan-
Turks.

356 THE WORLD CRISIS : the aftermath

Enver. of the ‘ Pious Foundations ’ endowments to the secular needs
of the State, and a rigorous disciplining of the professional
religious classes. It included also the startling economic,
social and literary changes which have recently been achieved
in Turkey. Mustapha Kemal has in fact executed a plan
decided upon, and to which he may well have been a party,
fifteen years ago. The centre point of all the Pan-Turk
schemes was the use of Germany to rid Turkey of the
Russian danger. Marschall von Bieberstein, for so many
years German Ambassador at Constantinople, nursed these
hidden fires with skilful hands.

Pan-Turkish schemes might have remained in dreamland
but for the fact that in a fateful hour there stood almost
at the head of Turkey a man of action. A would-be
Tvukish Napoleon, in whose veins surged warrior blood,
by his individual will, vanity and fraud was destined to
launch the Turkish Empire upon its most audacious
adventure. Enver, the German-trained but Turkish-
hearted subaltern, had * thrown his cap over the fence ’
(to quote himself) as the signal for the Young Turk
Revolution in 1909. Together with his handful of Young
Turk friends forming the committee of Union and
Progress, he had faced all the gathering foes. When
Italy had seized Tripoh, it was in the deserts of Tripoli
that Enver had fought ; when the armies of Balkan
Allies were at the lines of Chatalja, it was Enver who
had never despaired. ‘ Adrianople,’ said Mr. Asquith,
then Prime Minister in 1912, ‘will never be restored
to Turkey.' But Enver entered Adrianople within a
month, and Adrianople is Turkish to-day. The out-
break of the Great War saw Enver with his associate,
Talaat, and his skilful and incorruptible Finance Minister,
Djavid, in control of Turkidi affairs. Above them, an
imposing fa9ade, were the Sultan and the Grand Vizier : but
these men and their adherents were the unquestioned
governing power, and of them Enver in all action was the
explosive force. ^

^ I liappened to know all these men personally. I had met Enver at
the German manoeuvres in 1910. Talaat and Djavid had been our
hosts when, with Lord Birkenhead, I visited Constantinople in 1909.

TURKEY ALIVE

357

The Turkish leaders rated the might of Russia for the
rough and tumble of a general war far lower than did the
Western allies of the Czar. They were convinced that the
Germanic group would win the war on land, that Russia
would be severely mauled and that a revolution would
follow. Turkey would secure in the moment of a German
victory gains in territory and population in the Caucasus
which would at least ward off the Russian danger for several
generations. In the long preliminary discussions Germany
promised Turkey territorial satisfaction in the Caucasus in
the event of a victory by the Central Powers, This promise
was decisive upon Turkish policy.

The policy of the Pan-Turks in every sphere of Turkish
life and their territorial ambitions were embodied in a
definite war plan. This plan required as its foundation
the Turkish command of the Black Sea. Whenever the
Great War should come — ^as come they were sure it must
— ^and Russia was at grips with Germany and Austria, the
Pan-Turks intended to invade and conquer the Caucasus.
The control of the sea route from Constantinople to Trebi-
zond was indispensable to an advance from Trebizond
to Erzeroum. Hence Turkey must have a navy. Popular
subscriptions opened in 1911 and 1912 throughout Anatolia,
and even throughout Islam, provided the money for the
building for Turkey in Great Britain of two dreadnoughts.
The arrival of one at least of these battleships at Con-
stantinople was the peg upon which the whole Turkish war
plan hung. The supreme question in July, 1914, among
the Tmkish leaders was : Would the ships arrive in time ?
Obviously the margin was small. The first Tiukish dread-
nought, the ReshaAieh, was due for completion in July ; the
second, a few weeks later. Already Turkish agents in
Russian territory round Olti, Ardahan and Kars were busy
arranging for the hoarding of com crops by the Moslem
Tmrkish peasantry who formed the bulk of the population,
in order to make possible the advance of the Turkish columns
down the valley of the Chorukh and against the Russian rear.
On July 27 a secret defensive and offensive alliance between
Germany and Turkey against Russia was proposed by
Turkey, accepted forthwith by Germany, and signed on

German-

Turkish

Plans.

The Requi-
sition of the
Turkish
Battleships.

358 THE WORLD CRISIS : the aftermath

Aiigust 2, The mobilization of the Turkish Army was
ordered on July 31.

But now came a surprise. England suddenly assumed an
attitude of definite resistance to Germany. The British
fleets had put to sea in battle order. On July 28 I re-
quisitioned both the Turkish dreadnoughts for the Royal
Navy. A Turkish transport with five himdred Turkish
sailors on board lay in the Tyne ready to take over the
first. The Turkish Captain demanded delivery of the vessel,
and threatened to board her and hoist the Turkish flag.
In these tremendous days (July 31) I gave orders on my
own responsibility that this was to be prevented, and that
any attempt at seizure by the Turks should be resisted if
necessary by armed force. I took this action solely for
British naval purposes. The addition of the two Turkish
dreadnoughts to the British Fleet seemed vital to national
safety. No one in the Admiralty, nor so far as I know in
England, had any knowledge of the Turkish designs
or of the part these ships were to play in them. We
builded better than we knew. I was later in the year
criticized in some quarters for having requisitioned the
Turkish ships. The rage and disappointment excited
thereby throughout Turkey was said to have turned the
scale and provoked Tmkey into war against us. We now
know the inner explanation of this disappointment. The
requisitioning of these ships, so far from making Turkey
an enemy, nearly made her an Ally.

But there still remained to the Turks one hope ; the
Goeben. This fast German battle cruiser was in the western
Mediterranean under peace time orders to refit at Pola in
the Adriatic. She was in herself sufiicient to dominate the
Russian squadron in the Black Sea. Would the Germans
send the Goeben back to Constantinople ? Would she get
there ? It was at this moment that the news of the British
ultimatum to Germany, carrying with it the certainty of
a British declaration of war, reached Constantinople. The
Turkish realists had never cormted on such an event. It
transformed the naval situation in the Mediterranean.
Could the Goeben escape the numerous Britidi flotillas and
cruiser squadrons and the three more powerful though less

TURKEY ALIVE

359

speedy British, battle cruisers which lay between her and the The Goeben.
sea ? When on the night of August 3 Enver learned that the
Goehen was under orders to escape up the Adriatic to Pola,his
anxiety knew no bounds. Heimmediately sought the Russian
military attach^. General Leontev, and casting all previous
schemes to the wind, including the agreement he had signed
with Germany the day before, proposed to this astonished
officer an alliance between Turkey and Russia on various
conditions including Turkish compensations in Western
Thrace. Whether the Germans realized that they would
never be forgiven by the Pan-Turks unless the Goeben made
an effort to reach Constantinople, or whether it was already
part of their war plan, fresh orders to go to Constantinople
were at this moment (August 3) being sent by Admiral
Tirpitz to the Goeben then about to coal at Messina ; and
after events which are well known she reached the
Dardanelles on the loth and was after some parley admitted
to the Sea of Marmora.

Enver’s confidence was now restored, for the command
of the Black Sea rested potentially with the Turks.

But the certain hostihty of Great Britain was serious,
in view of her naval supremacy and the undefended
condition of the Dardanelles. Moreover Italy had un-
expectedly separated herself from the Triple Alliance.

It might therefore perhaps be prudent for Turkey to see
how the impending great battles on land, and especially
those upon the Russian front, were decided. Meanwhile
the mobilization of the Turkish Army could proceed un-
ostentatiously and be justified as a precautionary measure.

Thus there followed a period lasting for about three months
of Turkish hesitation and delay, having the effect of con-
summate duphcity. I can recall no great sphere of policy
about which the British Government was less completely
informed than the Tiukish. It is strange to read the
telegrams we received through all charmels from Constanti-
nople during this period in the light of our present knowledge.

But all the Alhes, now encouraged by the friendly assurances
of the Grand Vizier and the respectable-effete section of
the Cabinet, now indignant at the refusal to intern and
disarm the Goeben and generally mystified by many

Enver’s
Coup
d*itat :

The Final
Crash.

360 THE WORLD CRISIS : the aftermath

contradictory voices, believed that Turkey had no policy
and might still be won or lost. This period was ended
when Enver in November, acting as the agent of all
the Pan-Turk forces, delivered the improvoked attack by
the Goeben and the Turkish Fleet upon the Russian
Black Sea ports, and thus plunged Turkey brutally into
the war.

What followed has been to some extent recounted in
these volumes.

Turkey was animated, guided, and upheld during the
struggle for four years by the German military and intel-
lectual power. She contended with varying success against
Russia in the Caucasus, but the British Empire became her
greatest foe. The main strength of the Turkish Army was
broken on the Gallipoli Peninsula by British and Austra-
lasian forces. The British invasion of Mesopotamia, though
marked by notable Turkish victories, advcinced remorse-
lessly up the Tigris. Lawrence raised and led the Arab
revolt in the desert. AUenby, with an Anglo-Indian
Army of a quarter of a million, conquered Palestine and
entered S5nia. Although the French had commanded on
the Salonikan Front, and a French General presided over
the advance upon Constantinople from the west, the con-
viction of the Turks at the Armistice was that they had
been destroyed by England. Certainly three-quarters of
the Turks killed in the Great War had fallen to the
buUets and bayonets of the British Empire, and well they
knew the slaughter they had inflicted upon this old friend
and misjudged antagonist without mitigating his hostile
energy.

When the Hindenburg Line and Germany broke, all
Turkidi resistance fell flat on the ground. Turkey, pros-
trate, looked up and saw with relief that her conquerors
were British. ‘ We have made a great mistake ; we have
chosen the wrong side ; we were forced into it by Enver
and Talaat, but they have now fled. We sincerely regret
what has occurred. How could we teU that the United
States would go to war with Germany; or that Great
Britain would become a first-dass military Power ? Such
prodigies are beyond human foresight. No one ought to

TURKEY ALIVE 361

blame us for being so misled. Of course we must be
punished, but let us be chastised by our old friend, England.’
Such was the mood of Turkey for two or three months after
the armistice of Mudros on October 30, which ended the
Great War in the East.

In Lord Curzon’s words : —

‘ At the time the Peace G>nference assembled, the Allied
Powers were in possession of Constantinople, where the
Turkish Government, if not cowed, was subservient. Our
military power in the occupied Turkish regions of Asia was
suf&dent to enable us to enforce not merely the agreed
terms of the Armistice but also any supplementary terms
that were fotmd necessary. The British were in secure
possession of Mesopotamia up to and including Mosul, . . ,
The British position in Persia was, both in a military and
political sense, extraordinarily strong. We were still in
Trans-Caspia, but were contemplating an immediate retire-
ment, since accomplished. The Caspian was in our hands
and was being made the base of naval action against
Bolshevik forces. British divisions occupied the entire
Caucasus, from the Black Sea to the Caspian, and provided
the only guarantees for peace . . . between the rival
peoples : Georgians, Armenians, Tartars, Daghastanis, and
Russians. ... In Asia Minor (outside the region of British
military occupation) no Allied forces had appeared. The
fate of Armenia was undecided, the bulk of the Armenians
being fugitives from their country. Apart from Armenia,
and possibly Cilicia, the partition of Asia Minor was not
even contemplated. In Syria a more critical condition
existed, owing to the difficulty of reconciling the aspirations
of the French with the hard facts of the Arab situation and
the insistence of the French on the letter of the unfortunate
Sykes-Picot Agreement. In Palestine the interests of the
Arab population and the Zionist immigrants appeared to
be capable of reconciliation and everything pointed to an
early mandate for Great Britain with the consent of both.
Egypt was still quiet.’

In a situation of this kind, broad, clear, and above all,
swift decisions were needful. Every day’s delay in these
loosely knit but inflammable communities was loaded with
danger. There had already been two months’ delay ; and
all over this immense area, once the seat of ancient wealth
and civilizations, and now filled with fierce and fanatical
peoples largely armed, everyone was asking ' What has

After the
Armistice.

American

Criticism.

362 THE WORLD CRISIS : the aftermath

happened and what have we got to do ? ' But the victorious
statesmen in Paris had for them no answer. They had to
come to grips sind understanding with each other. They had
to explain to America what, as far as they knew, was happen-
ing in Europe. They had to face the vehement demands
of France that once her armies had reached the Rhine, they
diould never have to give it up. They had to mete out
what they considered justice and judgment to Germany,
and stand on guard with their armies to enforce what they
might prescribe. And around them welled and mounted
the flood of confusion.

President Wilson and the American Peace Delegation
and Staffs were all under the impression of the Secret
Treaties, and of their superior virtue in not being a party
to any of them. In the Middle East they were indeed
‘ the only disinterested Power.' This fact was undoubtedly
helpful, for much of the Secret Treaties made, as has been
described, in the pangs of war, had to be swept out of the
way. The influence of President Wilson and the United
States, uncompromised and at the same time most weighty,
was just the new element needed to make a good and
practical review and settlement possible. It was a tragedy
that President Wilson in action did not keep a closer grip
upon the realities. He rendered valuable, he had it in
his power to render invaluable services.

So President Wilson said that,

‘ The point of view of the United States of America was
indifferent to the claims both of Great Britain and of France
over peoples unless those peoples wanted them. One of
the fundamental principles to which the United States of
America adhered was &e consent of the governed. This
was ingrained in the thought of the United States of America,
Hence . . . the United States wanted to know whether
France would be agreeable to the S3nians. The same applied
as to whether Great Britain would be agreeable to the
inhabitants of Mesopotamia. It might not be his business,
but if the question was made his business owing to the fact
that it was brought before the Conference, the only way
to deal with it was to discover the desire of the population
of these regions.

‘He therefore suggested a Commission of Inquiry in

TURKEY ALIVE

363

Turkey and he gave his opinion of what they should
do/i

‘ Their object should be to elucidate the state of opinion
and the soil to be worked on by any mandatory. They
should be asked to come back and tell the Conference what
they foimd in this matter. ... It would . . . convince
the world that the Conference had tried to find the most
scientific basis of settlement. . . . The Commission should
be composed of an equal number of French, British, Italian
and American representatives. They would be sent out
with carte blanche to tell the facts as they found them.'

‘ The President,’ says Mr. Baker, ‘ was most enthusiastic
and urgent in pressing this idea.'

Now nothing could be more plausible than this request.
In fact, we know in domestic politics that when matters
are complicated and tempers are rising, the usual house-
hold remedy is to appoint a committee or a Royal Com-
mission. And this remedy is very often efficacious.
Although the problem is not solved by the Commission,
although the Commission are probably less competent to
solve it than the responsible Ministers, in a great many cases
a long delay, the patient taking of evidence and the resulting
ponderous Blue Book, make it probable that the problem
will be presented in a different and peradventure a less
acute form. It was natural that President Wilson should
propose this device, and inevitable that the sharply divided
Powers should acquiesce in it. Certainly no blame can
attach to anyone.

But the nations concerned would not stand so long at
the footstool of undecided power, and of all the processes
likely to rouse their passion, none was more apt than the
peripatetic Commission of Inquiry making a roving pro-
gress in search of truth through all the powder magazines
of the Middle East with a notebook in one hand and a
lighted cigarette in the other. Anyone could see how
sensible and right President Wilson was, and how well his
proposal would have suited a political difficulty in the
United States or in Great Britain. But of course in the
circumstances and the atmosphere it was simply a means
1 Stannard Baker, Vol. 1 , p. 76.

President

Wilson’s

Commission.

Insurgence

and

Paralysis.

364 THE WORLD CRISIS : the aftermath

of preparing explosions. Statesmen in a crisis, like generals
or a dmirals in war, have often to take fateful decisions
without knowing a very large proportion of the essential
facts. It is hard to do this, but anything is better than
not taking decisions at aU. To stroll around among masses
of disorganized, infuriated, people, asking them what they
think about it and what they would like, is the most sure and
certain method of breeding strife. When one is helping in
affairs which one does not understand and in which one
is scarcely 'at all interested, a mood of elevated and airy
detachment easily dominates the mind. ' Let us have aU.
the facts unfolded before we take our decision. Let us
know where we are. Let us ascertain the wishes of the
population.’ How prudent and correct it all sounds 1 But
before the Commission, on which in the end only America
was represented, had gone a third of the way through
the sphere of their studies, almost all the peoples concerned
were in armed revolt and almost all the Allied troops had
gone home.

However, from the date of the appointment of the Com-
mission the whole of the Middle East was placed under an
indefinite decree of hesitancy and investigation. When
from day to day a dozen harsh local problems, all expressed
in terms of people shooting one another, were presented
to the British Public Departments concerned, the only
Minute which could be written by any official was, ' These
matters must wait until the Inter-AlKed Commission has
completed its inquiry.' So the friendly elements kept on
marking time and asking questions, and the unfriendly
elements loaded their rifles and made plans.

But all this might have subsided and come back into
hand but for one act, positive, aggressive, and by every
standard of statecraft wrong. The claims and ambitions
of Italy to lay hands upon the Turkish Empire out-
stripped the -boldest imagination. And Italy lost no time
in startling Paris with proof that she would back her aims
with deeds. The decision to send a commission to the
East to which Italy was a party had scarcely been taken,
when the Italians, on the pretext of a local riot, seized
Adalia and at the same time officially complained that the

TURKEY ALIVE

365

Greeks were making preparations for a descent upon Smyrna.
The Greeks on their side cried out that the Italian action
at Adalia was only a prelude to an encroachment upon the
sphere of Greek aspirations. Towards the end of April it
was reported that the Italians had landed small parties of
troops at Budrum, Makri, and Alaya. At the same time
the Triumvirate, attracted by the prestige and personality
of Venizelos, was moving steadily towards assigning
Smyrna with the ALdin Province to the Greeks. Sm5una
and portions of its littoral had been populated extensively
by Greeks for thousands of years. Its prosperity was
largely attributable to their intelligence and to their
industry and agriculture. As early as 1915 Mr. Asquith’s
Government had resolved that in any partition of Turkey,
Greece if she took part in the war ought to have Smyrna.
The Territorial Commission on Greece at the Peace Con-
ference had by a majority, including British, French and
American members, newly decided in favour of the Greek
claim. President Wilson had definitely accepted that
conclusion. The rumour of this intention had however
roused the protests of the Smyrna European colony, and the
American missionaries in Sm3una vied with the British High
Commissioner at Constantinople in their separate simul-
taneous warnings against the perils of such a step.

The complete breach between President Wilson and the
Italian delegation had at this moment led to the temporary
withdrawal of Italy from the conference. In the ardour
'of his encounter with Signor Orlando it was natural that
Wilson should lean to Greece. Here he found an only too
eager sympathizer in the British Prime Minister. Clemen-
ceau, preoccupied with the Rhine and the future of France,
moved amicably with these two. Events now precipitated
action. The reports that the Italians were going to seize
Sm3una forcibly, combined with stories of Turkish maltreat-
ment of the Greek population, provoked a deadly step. On
May 5 the Triumvirate entertained the project that the
Greeks should be allowed to occupy Smyrna forthwith for
the purpose of protecting their compatriots there. Mr.
Lloyd George asked for a decision that M. Venizelos might
be authorized to send troops to be kept on board ship at

A Deadly
Step.

366 THE WORLD CRISIS : the aftermath

The Greek Smyrna ready for landing in case of necessity. President
Wilson asked why the troops should not be landed at once
as the men did not keep in good condition on board ship.
Mr. Uoyd George did not demur.

The subject was dealt with again on May lo. The
principle of the landing was however assumed to be settled
and only practical details were discussed. Sir Henry
Wilson was present on both occasions but confined himself
to the technical aspects. On the i2th a third meeting was
held. Signor Orlando had now returned to the fold. He
was assured that the future destination of Smyrna would not
be prejudiced by a Greek occupation. It was an emergency
measure for the protection of the Greek population. In
accordance with Armistice conditions notice must be given
to Turkey to surrender the Sm5nna forts to British, French
and Italian detachments. Signor Orlando, after considera-
tion, made no objection in principle to the landing but urged
that the British, French and Italian detachments should not
be withdrawn pending a final settlement. The decision of
the Council of Four was that the Greek forces should start
from Kavalla as soon as ready and that the Itahan detach-
ment should take part in the operations of the allied forces.

Venizelos is entitled to plead that in going to Sm3nma he
acted as mandatory for the four greatest Powers. But
he went as readily as a duck wiU swim. Whatever the
responsibihties of the Four or rather of the Triumvirate,
for they were the moving force, his own are ineffaceable.
He alone possessed the means of action. There coidd never
have been any question of sending British, French or
American troops except in symbolic detachments on such
a mission. But Greek divisions were within swift and easy
striking distance ; and were straining at the leash. On
May 15, in spite of serious warnings and protests from the
British Foreign Of&ce and War Office, twenty thousand
Greek troops, covered by the fire of their warships, landed
at Sm37ma, killed a large number of Turks, occupied the
city, advanced rapidly up the Sm3nna-Aidin railway, had
a bloody fight with Turkish troops and irregulars and the
TurkMi population of Aidin, and set up their standards
of invasion and conquest in Asia Minor.

TURKEY ALIVE 367

I well remember the bewilderment and alarm with which
I heard on a lovely afternoon in Paris of this fatal
event. No doubt my personal views were affected by
the consternation it produced upon the British General
Stafi. Making every allowance for the pro-Turk inclin-
ations of the British military mind, it was impossible to
excuse the imprudence of this violent act, which opened
so many new perils when our resources were shrivelling. At
the War Ofhce we were not long in feeling its consequences.
Our officers in twos and threes were all over Asia Minor super-
vising the surrender of armies and munitions as prescribed
by the Armistice. They rode about freely and imarmed
from place to place, and with their finger indicated what
diould be done. They were almost mechanically obeyed.
Important ‘ dumps ' of rifles, machine guns, cannon and
shells were being submissively piled up ; Txorkey was tmder
the spell of defeat, and of deserved defeat. ‘ Let us be
punished by our old friend England.’ So the arms were
stacked and the guns were parked and the shells were
arranged in massive heaps as the accepted result of stricken
fields and of conventions signed.

But from the moment that the Turkish nation — and,
though Paris did not seem to know it, there was a nation
— realized that it was not Britain and India and Allenby that
they had to endure and for the time obey, but Greece, the
hated and despised foe of generations — ^to their eyes a
revolted province, certainly a frequently defeated opponent ;
from that moment, Turkey became rmcontrollable. The
British officers supervising the execution of the Armistice
terms were first ignored, then insulted, then chased for
their lives or flung mto arduous captivity.^ The ‘ dumps ’
in which the equipment of considerable armies was already
gathered passed in a week from British to Turkish
control ; and Mustapha Kemal, the Man of Destiny whom
we have met in these volumes on the Gallipoli Peninsula
in April and in August, 1915 — ^tiU then almost a rebel,

^ Colonel Sir Alfred Kawlinson, brother of the renowned Commander
of the Fourth Army, snfEeced the worst experiences. His personal
account of a long bondage which shattered his health and nearly
cost him his life is w^ worth reading.

Turkey

Alive.

Justice

changes

Camps.

368 THE WORLD CRISIS : the aftermath

against the Turkish Government at Constantinople, — ^was
furnished with the power, as he already possessed the
qualities, of a Warrior Prince.

But more important than the recapture of arms and
munitions were the moral advantages which flowed to his
cause. We have explained how cold-blooded and malignant
Turkish policy in the Great War had been, and how well
founded were the grievances of the Allies against her.
The ghastly fate of the Armenians has yet to be recorded.
Nevertheless the whole attitude of the Peace Conference
towards Turkey was so harsh that Right had now changed
sides. Justice, that eternal fugitive from the councils of
conquerors, had gone over to the opposite camp. Defeat,
thought the Turks, must be accepted and its consequences
must be borne : but the loosing of the Greek army into
Asia Minor, at the very moment when Turkey was being
disarmed, boded the destruction and death of the Turkish
nation and their suppression and subjugation as a race among
men. On June 9 in the little town of Kharas near Amasia,
Mustapha Kemal publidy expounded his plans, for the
salvation of Turkey. All the half raked-out fires of Pan-
Turkism began to glow again. That Greeks should conquer
Turks was not a decree of Fate which any Turk would
recognize. Loaded with follies, stained with crimes, rotted
with misgovemment, shattered by battle, worn down by long
disastrous wars, his Empire falling to pieces arotmd him, the
Turk was still alive. In his breast was beating the heart
of a race that had challenged the world, and for centuries
had contended victoriously against all comers. In his hands
was once again the equipment of a modem army, and at his
head a Captain, who with all that is learned of him, ranks
with the four or five outstanding figures of the cataclysm.
In the tapestried and gilded chambers of Paris were
assembled the law-givers of the world. In Constantinople,
under the guns of the Allied Fleets there functioned a puppet
Government of Turkey. But among the stem bills and
valleys of ‘ the Turkish Homelands ’ in Anatolia, there dwelt
that company of poor men . . . who would not see it
settled so ; and at their bivouac fires at this moment sate
in the rags of a refugee the august Spirit of Fair Play,

TURKEY ALIVE

369

I cannot understand to this day how the eminent states- Headlines,
men in Paris, Wilson, Lloyd George, Clemenceau and
Venizelos, whose wisdom, prudence, and address had raised
them under the severest tests so much above their fellows,
could have been betrayed into so rash and fatal a step.

Many will be surprised at the prominence which I give
to the episode of the Greek invasion of Smyrna at the behest
of the Allies. It has been my endeavour in these volumes to
show the stepping-stones of fate. Out of an incompre-
hensible fecundity of violent and interesting facts and com-
binations of facts, I try to choose those that really mattered.

Here then we have reached a new turning-point in the
history of the peoples of the Middle East.

However, the meaning of Sm3nrna was obscured at the
time from the public eye. There was so much to talk about,
so many exciting and important things to do, so many
rough and disagreeable episodes to record, so many high
ideals to strive for, that the mere sending of a couple of
Greek Divisions to Smyrna and the shooting of a few him-
dred Turks at the landing did not seem to make any impres-
sion upon public opinion in the principal Allied countries.

The five hundred exceptionally able correspondents and
writers who beset the purlieus of the Conference pumped
out their eighty thousand words a night, and there were
always plenty of headlines in all the leading newspapers with
the largest circulations. No doubt among these headlines,

'GREEK DIVISIONS LAND IN SMYRNA: Turkish
resistance overpowered’ found its place. But next day
there was something else. There have to be headlines for
every day. It was not the fault of the newspapers or of
the public. Both were surfeited with sensation, and the
public, though it read the newspapers, was busy buildiag
up its homes and businesses. They may well be granted
' leave of absence on urgent private affairs.'

We must now record chronologically a few events. The
Young Turk leaders who had ruled Turkey from the revo-
lution of 1910 to the end of the Great War were scattered
and in exile. Enver, after desperate adventures and ex-
ploits in Turkestan, was to perish in the field. Talaat was
to be diot dead in Berlin by an Armenian, who certainly had

AA

Ferid.

370 THE WORLD CRISIS : the aftermath

public cause for bis revenge. Djavid was to be executed in
1926 by the triumphant Mustapha Kemal and to mount the
scaffold ‘ repeating the stanzas of an old Turkish poem.’ A
new figure, fleeting but recognizable, now appears in Turkish
politics. Ferid Pasha had taken office on March 4, 1919, with
a submissive policy and in close alliance with the Sultan. All
around him in Constantinople were the warships and bayo-
nets of the Allies. Out in the mountains of Asia Minor in
sombre mood and half-mutinous attitude were the survivors
and rank and file of the leaderless Committee of Union and
Progress. Between these two sets of compulsions Ferid
held his balance precariously. He bowed and expostulated
to the Allies and kept himself in friendly touch with the
Nationalists. In protest against the occupation of Sm3nma
he resigned ; he resumed office the same day. On June 7
he led a Peace Delegation to Paris to appeal for the lenient
treatment of Turkey. He received a scathing reply from
the Conference. On July i he appointed Mustapha Kemal
Inspector-General to Northern Asia Minor. In August and
September Mustapha Kemal convened congresses of Eastern
delegates at Erzeroum and Sivas. On September ii the
Sivas Congress published a manifesto of Turkish rights
which subsequently formed the ‘ National Pact,' or solemn
covenant of the new Turkey. By the end of September the
authority of Constantinople did not extend beyond the
shores of the Bosphorus and the Sea of Marmora. Even
Brusa, an hour by rail from the Marmora shore, seceded
to the Angora Government in October. Ferid resigned
again to make way for a Government half-way between the
Sultan in the grip of the Allies, and Mustapha Kemal and
his National Pact at Angora.

Meanwhile our armies were melting fast. In ’January,
1919, the War Office had still nearly three million men abroad
under its orders. In March it had two, and these in a rapid
process of demobilization. By mid-summer, 1919, apart from
the forces on the Rhine, we had hardly any troops at aU.
The conscript and war-enrolled forces had to be sent home ;
the new permanent army was forming ; and volunteers
for professional military service were only gradually forth-
coming. A year after the Armistice we counted in

TURKEY ALIVE

371

battalions of five or six Imndred men, where we had
previously disposed of divisions of fifteen or twenty
thousand complete in eveiy detail. It was very strange
to watch the vast shrinkage of our militaxy power, while at
the same time the increase of danger and hostility in
almost every quarter could be so plainly discerned. In
December, 1919, I circulated to the Cabinet a General
Staff memorandum explaining how far our power had
diminished and pointing out the disproportion between
our policy and our strength.

Para. 3. (i) ‘ It seems scarcely necessary to mention that
the situation has changed considerably since the commence-
ment of the Turkish Armistice on 31st October, 1918, both
as regards the armed resources of His Majesty's Government
and the political situation within the pre-War Turkish
Empire. The British military contribution now available
for enforcing peace terms, otherwise than in Palestine and
Mesopotamia, is as follows ; —

One division plus army troops (including garrison of
Batum), comprising:

British, 13,000 ; Indian, 18,000 ; a total of 31,000 com-
batants.

The striking power of this force would be practically
limited to the railway system. And here the General Staff
wish to observe that without resorting to the raising of
fredi troops by conscription or other means no British
reinforcements will be available for Turkey.'

The General Staff proceed to express the hope that : —

‘ Only such terms wiU be seriously considered by His
Majesty’s Government, in the first place, as may be reason-
ably compatible with the resources which exist or which
it may be intended to provide for their execution.

Without going into detail or the political pros and cons
of the various questions, the General Staff wish to record
the following list of measures which may be advocated for
various reasons, but the enforcement of which, according
to their information, might call for reinforcement of the
Army of the Black Sea, either by our Allies or farther
British levies : —

(i) The creation of a Greater Armenia, linking up Cilicia

with the Erivan Republic.

(ii) The creation of an independent Kurdistan.

(iii) Acquisition by Greece of any portion of the Pontus

(sic).

The Melting
of the
Annies.

372 THE WORLD CRISIS : the aftermath

(iv) Permanent occupation by Greece of any part of the

Aidin Vilayet.

(v) Permanent occupation of any part of Southern

Anatolia or Konia by Italy, though it is doubtful
whether this would cause such resentment to the
Turks as any other of the above causes.

In addition to the above measures, which would call for
immediate reinforcements, the adoption of either of the
following would call for the retention of a permanent
garrison for a period which it is impossible to estimate ; —

(vi) Acquisition by Greece of Eastern Thrace.

(vii) Expulsion of the Turks from Constantinople.

But so far from coming to any decision, the Allies were
content in the presence of their differences to let matters
slide. While the American Coimnission roamed dis-
turbingly around the Middle East, the most fantastic plans
for the partition of Turkey were indulged in. There were
to be no annexations, but ‘ mandates ’ were to be granted
to the principal Powers which would give them the neces-
sary excuses for control. France was to take Syria and
Cilicia ; Italy blithely undertook to occupy the whole of
the Caucasus as well as the province of Adalia in the Asia-
Minor Promontory ; England seemed anxious to take over
Mesopotamia and Palestine which our armies already held ;
and there was a lively expectation that the United States
would accept a mandate for Armenia. In January, 1920,
Greece, which was bearing the brunt of these protracted
financial, military and political uncertainties, began to show
signs of strain.

In these seductive delusions the year 1919 ebbed away.
Slowly, fitfully, laboriously, with frequent disputes and
exhausting argument, the future of the Middle East was
mapped out in Paris and a draft of the Treaty of Peace
with Turkey prepared. Several exciting questions awaited
the decision of the various Governments. December 1919
and January 1920 saw the British Cabinet deeply moved
upon whether the Sultan in his capacity as Caliph should,
under innumerable restrictions, be allowed to remain at
Constantinople ; or whether on the other hzmd the Turks
diould be expelled ‘ bag and baggage ’ from Europe. A
secondary issue was whether the mosque of San Sophia

Restrictions

and

Illusions.

TURKEY ALIVE

373

should be reconsecrated a Christian Church. In these Talks aiioiit
controversies Lord Curzon, mounted upon the Foreign
Office, rode full tilt against Mr. Edwin Montagu, whose
chariot was drawn by the public opinion of India, the
sensibilities of the Mohammedan world, the pro-Turkish
propensities of the Conservative Party, and the voluminous
memoranda of the India Office.

The combat w^as well sustained. According to Mr. Montagu,
the expulsion of the Tmrks and the Caliph from Constanti-
nople with the assent or even with the connivance of England,
would strike a last fatal blow at the dim i nishing loyalties
of the two or three hundred peoples and religious sects who
inhabit the Indian Peninsula. According to Lord Curzon
they would not mind at all. Some wordd rather like it ;
most would be indifferent ; while the Mohammedans, who
were alone concerned, had not hesitated to fight with vigour
and courage in various theatres of war against the armies
of the said Caliph. On the question of the reconsecration
of San Sophia, Mr. Montagu urged that it had been a Moham-
medan Mosque of great sanctity for upwards of 469 years.

We were all much swayed by this, imtil Lord Curzon rejoined
that it had been previously a Christian Church for 915
years. Then the argument seemed very nicely balanced ;
a substantial modem title as against twice as lengthy
an original prescription ! This was one of those questions
the rights and wrongs of which might well be debated by
the university students of almost any country.

On the main issue of Constantinople Mr. Lloyd George
was whole-heartedly with Lord Curzon. Indeed, on this
he was himself a prime mover. The War Office intervened
with their dreary drone, voiced by Field-Marshal Wilson
and me, that we had not got any soldiers, and how could
you drive and keep the Turks out of Constantinople without
soldiers ? We continued with the India Office to ingeminate
a Turkish peace, real, final, and above all, prompt. As
long as the Dardanelles could be kept open for the free
passage of the ships, including the warships, of all nations,
we were content. That would entail the permanent occupa-
tion of both sides of the Straits by international forces, for
which, within our limited means, our quota could be provided.

Cabinet

Decision.

374 THE WORLD CRISIS : the aftermath

Such an arrangement might in a few years become only an
unchallenged formality.

These issues as they were fought out in the British Cabinet
have already been made public quite as far as is proper in
the Life of Lord Curzon?- It is not necessary to elaborate
them here. An Anglo-French Conference was held in
London at the Foreign Ofi&ce at Christmas [1919] to settle
the many thorny difficulties between the two Governments
upon the Turkish and Arab problems. Mr. Lloyd George,
so patient and good-tempered a Chief, had a habit of pick-
ing his colleagues for any preliminary discussions so as to have
a working majority of those who were favourable to his view.
One set for one phase of a question and another for its
complementary part ! This was perhaps evil constitutional
practice ; but again it may have been the only way in these
crowded times to get things done. When, however, the
completed work came before the Cabinet on January 9,
every Minister having a right to be present, an over-
whelmmg majority decided, after a fax more spirited debate
than is usually heard in the House of Commons, that the
Turks should stay at Constantinople. The Prime Minister
accepted in good part the decision of his colleagues, and
the next day announced it to Parliament in a speech of
convincing power.

The Treaty of Sevres accordingly prescribed that Con-
stantinople should remain the Turkish capital. For the rest
the Bosphorus, the Marmora, and the Dardanelles were to
be an open waterway under international guardianship for
all vessels. Besides Western Thrace and Eastern Thrace
almost up to the line of Chatalja, Greece should possess the
Gallipoli Peninsula, the majority of the .®gean Islands, and
should administer Smyrna and its hinterland imtil a plebis-
cite could be held there. Turkey must re-establish the
capitulations and submit her armaments and finances to
stringent Allied control. She should undertake to enforce
the conventional safeguards for racial and religious minori-
ties. The French were to have S37ria, then in frantic
ebullition ; England would shoulder liie costly and trouble-
some mandate of Palestine and Mesopotamia ; and the
^ By Lord Ronaldshay.

TURKEY ALIVE

375

Armenians were left to sit on the doorstep of the United
States. Coincident with the signature of the Treaty of
Sevres and conditional upon its ratification, Great Britain,
France and Italy put their names to a tripartite treaty
which gave them as spheres of influence those territories
which had been assigned to each of these Powers in the
Sykes-Picot arrangement and at the conference of St. Jean
de Maurienne.

While all these decrees were for the moment unannounced,
we must observe the march of Facts. Over stony roads,
through the defiles of thorny and rock-clad hills, across ochre
deserts baking in the sim, the weary, sullen caravan of
Facts kept pertinaciously jogging along. Let us return for
a moment to them.

On January 12, 1920, the new Chamber of Turkish Deputies
met in Constantinople. The Allies were loyal to the principle
of representative government ; accordingly the Turks had
voted. Unhappily, they had almost all of them voted the
wrong way. The new Chamber was preponderantly
Nationalist, or, it might be said, Kemalist. So awkward
was this that on January 21 the Allies required, as a measure
of practical day-to-day security, the resignation of the
Turkish Minister of War and of the Chief of the General
Staff. On the 28th the new Chamber approved and signed
the ‘National Pact.’ Confronted by imminent revolt in
Constantinople itself and with shocking possibilities of
massacre, the European Allies were forced to united action.
On March 16 Constantinople was occupied by British, French
and Italian forces. Ferid was induced once again to brew
the thmnest government he had yet attempted. At the
end of April the Turkish National Assembly met at Angora
far beyond the reach of Allied fleets and armies. On May 13
— a. bad date — ^Venizelos made public in Athens the terms
of the Treaty of Sevres. In June the British outpost line
across the Ismid Peninsula was attacked by Kemalist forces.
The attack was not serious. The troops were ordered to
fire without hesitation ; the Navy hurled shells from the
Sea of Marmora, and the assailants withdrew out of range.
But there they remained, and we were once again, this time
with scanty forces, ‘ in the presence of the enemy.’ At

The March
of Facts.

376 THE WORLD CRISIS : the aftermath

Attack on the same time the French, who, after driving Emir Feisal
fro™ throne at Damascus, had encountered heavy fighting
in Cilicia (and on the same day that the forthcoming terms
of the Treaty of Sevres were announced in Athens), thought
well to ask the local Turks for an armistice.

Venizelos now presented himself as the good fairy. The
Greek Army would come to the rescue. Two divisions of
the five already in Smyrna would march northward, and
passing to the east of the Marmora through difficult coimtry
(which, however, they declared they understood) would fall
upon the Turks menacing the Ismid Peninsula and drive
them away. Marshal Foch, carrying with him the opinion
of the British General Staff, declared that the operation
was dangerous and would probably be unsuccessful. Mr.
Lloyd George, however, accepted the offer, and the Greek
advance began on June 22. It was immediately successful.
The Greek columns trailed along the country roads passing
safely through many ugly defiles, and at their approach
the Turks, imder strong and sagacious leadership, vanished
into the recesses of Anatolia. At the beginning of July
the Greeks entered Brusa. In the same month another
Greek army swiftly overran eastern Thrace, broke down a
feeble Turkish resistance, and occupied Adrianople.

The remarkable and unexpected manifestations of Greek
power were hailed by the Ally statesmen ; the Ally generals
rubbed their eyes ; Mr. Lloyd George became enthusiastic.
He was right again, it seemed, and the military men wrong,
as they so often had been — vide Armageddon.

The events sealed the Treaty of Sevres. Ferid dutifully
constructed a Ministry of marionettes, and on August 10,
1920, with due solemnity, the Treaty of Peace with Turkey
was signed at S&vres. This instrument, which had taken
eighteen months to fashion, was obsolete before it was ready.
All its main clauses depended for their effect upon one
thing only : the Greek Army. If Venizelos and his soldiers
would clear up the situation and reduce Mustapha Kemal
to law and order, all would be well. If not, some other form
of words in closer conformity with the actual facts would
have to be devised. At last peace with Turkey; and.to ratify
it. War with Turkey I However, so far as the Great Allies

TURKEY ALIVE

377

were concerned tlie war was to be fought by proxy. Wars
when fought thus by great nations are often very dangerous ^
for the proxy.

Although this chapter has dealt solely with Turkish afifairs,
it must be brought into relation with the general situation
of Europe. I cannot do this better than by reprinting a
letter which I wrote to Mr. Lloyd George on starting for a
brief Easter holiday in France.

Mr. CkurcMll to the Prime Minister.

March 24, 1920.

I write this as I am crossing the Channel to teU you
what is in my mind. Since the Armistice my policy would
have been ‘ Peace with the German people, war on the
Bolshevik t3nranny.’ Willingly or unavoidably, you have
followed something very near the reverse. Knowing the
difficulties, and also your great skill and personal force —
so much greater than mine — I do not judge your policy and
action as if I could have done better, or as if anyone could
have done better. But we are now face to face with the
results. They are terrible. We may well be within
measurable distance of universal collapse and anarchy
throughout Europe and Asia. Russia has gone into ruin.
What is left of her is in the power of these deadly snakes.

But Germany may perhaps still be saved. I have felt
with a great sense of relief that we may be able to think
and act together in harmony about Germany : that you
are inclined to make an effort to rescue Germany from her
frightful fate — which if it overtakes her may well overtake
others. If so, time is short and action must be simple.
You ought to tell France that we will make a defensive
alliance with her against Germany if, and only if, she entirely
alters her treatment of Germany and loyally accepts a
British policy of help and friendship towards Germany.
Next you should send a great man to Berlin to help con-
solidate the anti-Spartacist anti-Ludendorff elements into a
strong left centre block. For this task you have two levers :
first, food and credit, which must be generously accorded
in spite of our own difficulties (whidi otherwise will worsen) ;
secondly, early revision of the Peace Treaty by a Conference
to which New Germany shall be invited as an equal partner
in the rebuilding of Europe.^ Using these levers it ought to

^ This, of course, referred to the economic and financial clauses.

— W. S. C.

378 THE WORLD CRISIS : the aftermath

My Letter jje possible to rally all that is good and stable in the German

of March 24. -fj^eir own redemption and to the salvation of

Europe. I pray that we may not be ' too late.’

Surely this is a matter far more worth while taking your
political life in your hands for than our party combinations
at home, important though they be. Surely also it is a
matter which once on the move would dominate the whole
world situation at home and abroad. My suggestion involves
open resolute action by Britain under your guidance, and if
necessary independent action. In such a course I would
gladly at your side face political misfortune. But I believe
there would be no misfortune, and that for a few months
longer Britain still holds the title-deeds of Europe.

As a part of such a policy I should be prepared to make
peace with Soviet Russia on the best terms available to
appease the general situation, while safeguarding us from
being poisoned by them. I do not of course believe that
any real harmony is possible between Bolshevism and present
civilization. But in view of the existing facts a cessation
of arms and a promotion of material prosperity are indispens-
able : and we must trust for better or for worse to peaceful
influences to bring about the disappearance of this awful
tyranny and peril.

Compared to Germany, Russia is minor ; compared to
Russia, Turkey is petty. But I am also very anxious about
your policy towards Turkey. With military resources which
the Cabinet have cut to the most weak and slender pro-
portions, we are leading the Allies in an attempt to enforce
a peace on Turkey which would require great and powerful
armies and long, costly operations and occupations. On
this world so tom with strife I dread to see you let loose
the Greek armies — ^for all sakes and certainly for their sakes.
Yet the Greek armies are your only effective fighting force.
How are you going to feed Constantinople if the railways
in Asia Minor are cut and supplies do not arrive ? Who
is going to pay ? From what denuded market is the food
to come ? I fear you will have this great city lolling help-
lessly on your hands, while all around will be guerrilla and
blockade. Here again I counsel prudence and appeasement.
Try to secure a really representative Turkish governing
authority, and come to terms with it. As at present couched
the Turkish Treaty means indefinite anarchy.

CHAPTER XVIII

GREEK TRAGEDY

A Retrospect — The Rise of Venizdos — Greece in the Great War
— Constantine’s Divine Right — ^The General Victory — Com-
mitments in Thrace and Smyrna — ^The Young King — ^The
Monkey’s Bite — ^The Greek Election — ^Fall of Venizelos : Its
Reactions — Return of Constantine — ^Isolation of Greece —

Mr. Lloyd George’s View — Curzon and Montagu — ^Unofficial
Encouragement — ^My Own Position, February 22, June ii
and June 25 — ^The Greek Advance — ^The Battle of Eskishdir
— ^The Battle of the Sakaria — ^A Further Opportunity —

Armenia and the Pan-Turks — ^The rgis Massacres — ^The
Turkish Conquest — ^The Friends of Armenia — Obliteration
Once More.

T his story carries us back to classic times. It is true A Retro-
Greek tragedy, •with. Chance as the ever-ready hand- * 1 *®*^-
maid of Fate. However the Greek race might have altered
in blood and quality, their characteristics were found un-
changed since the days of Aldbiades. As of old, they pre-
ferred faction above all other interests, and as of old in their
crisis they had at their head one of the greatest of men.

The interplay between the Greek love of party politics and
the influence exercised over them by Venizelos constitute
the action of the piece. The scene and the lighting are
the Great War ; and the theme, ‘ How Greece gained the
Empire of her dreams in spite of herself, and threw it
away when she awoke.’ A prologue must be provided
in the form of a retrospect.

In 1908 the Greek Monarchy was in dire straits. Ever
since the King and the Princes had commanded in the
disastrous war against Turkey in 1897, their situation had
been uncomfortable. They were bitterly attacked by the
oftcers of the Greek army, and there was a strong anti-
monarchical movement. It was proposed that they should
not be allowed to hold any military command in case a

379

The Rise of
Venizelos.

380 THE WORLD CRISIS : the afteemath

wax between the Balkan States and Turkey should break out.
Many other similar humiliations were inflicted upon the
reigning house. However, there arose in Crete a remarkable
man moulded on classic scale and design. He effected the
liberation of Crete from Turkey by a rebellion in- which he
gained the support of the Great Powers. By his energies
and their aid Crete threw off the Turkish yoke, and as a
stepping-stone to reunion with Greece, gained autonomy
under a Greek Prince. In 1909 Venizelos passed from Crete
to Greece; in 1910 he became Prime Minister. He purged and
reformed the administration in all its branches. He reorgan-
ized the Fleet under British, and the Army imder French
guidance. He restored the King to the head of the army.

The Sovereign, having at his side this great Constable,
swiftly regained popularity among the people. Greece
enjoyed for some years the strongest of all political com-
binations for a small country, a constitutional monarch
and a national leader, each working in his proper sphere,
and rendering loyalty and honour to the other. Venizelos
formed the Balkan League and prepared and inspired the
war upon Turkey which followed in 1912. The Greeks,
Serbs and Bulgarians, helped greatly by the fighting
quality of the last, defeated Turkey, took Adrianople and
Salonika, and nearly took Constantinople itself. Great
extensions of territory had already been gained by these
allies. The Bulgarians, demanding too much and ever
forward in quarrels, were fallen upon by their confeder-
ates on the one hand and by Romnania on -the other.
They were speedily overwhelmed by this combination, and
were not only cut out of all territorial gains, but actually
despoiled of their native province of the Dobrudja. In
two years the kingdom of Greece was nearly doubled in
extent zind population. Crete wjls reunited with the Mother-
land, and not only Salonika, but Kavalla, was added to
the Greek domain. Thus Constantine saw himself and
his kingdom carried by an enormous stride towards the
Greek dream of empire. At this point Armageddon began.

Earlier volumes have briefly described the attitude of
Greece during the Great Wax. We may, however, display
the claims of Venizelos upon the loyalty of the Allies.

GREEK TRAGEDY

381

Constantine, married to the Kaiser’s sister, and under a Greece in
profound impression of German military prestige and
ef&ciency, believed throughout that Germany would win.

His convictions were shared by the Greek General Staff. But
Venizelos judged by other standards. He proclaimed that
rightlay with the Allies ; he discerned their future victory.

‘ England in all her wars,’ he said in a dark hour, ‘ has
always gained one battle — the last ! ’ He acted upon these
opinions. He so far persuaded and over-persuaded Constan-
tine and his generals, that late in August 1914, after the
French had lost the Battles of the Frontiers and before the
victory of the Marne, when it seemed that the Germans
were marching on irresistibly to the capture of Paris — at
this very moment he offered the naval and military forces
of Greece to the Allies from the time when Great Britain
should judge it expedient to call upon them. He took this
step in the face of the implacable resentment of Bulgaria for
the Balkan war, and before Turkey had attacked the Allies.

Such a resolve, taken with sureness and deliberation in the
teeth of such hazards by an experienced and established
statesman, proves a prevision beyond compare.

The story of the Dardanelles shows that Venizelos would
always have been ready to participate in a well-planned
attack by land and sea upon the Gallipoli Peninsula. British
diplomacy, influenced to some extent by Russian mis-
givings, had rejected the Greek offer of assistance in the
preceding autumn, and tmless Constantine had been irre-
vocably committed to war against Germany, it seemed
impossible to make the Greek Government a party to our
plans. The melancholy course of events at the Dardanelles
and the incapacity which they revealed did not weaken the
fidelity of Venizelos to the Allies. When the peril of Serbia
by Bulgarian invasion drew nearer in the summer of 1915,
he invoked the Treaty binding Greece to come to the aid
of Serbia and thus join in the general war. Constantine
resisted. Venizelos resigned. As a result of a general
election held in June he was returned to power on August 23.

He obtained from the King authority for general mobiliza-
tion. Further than this Constantine would not go; he
refused definitely to enter the war. According to Venizelos,

Constan-

tine*s

Divine

Right.

382 THE WORLD CRISIS : the aftermath

he explained this overriding of his Prime Minister newly
fortified by a national mandate as follows : ‘ I recognize that
I am bound to obey the popular verdict when it is a question
of internal affairs ; but when it is a question of foreign affairs
my view is that so long as I consider a thing right or wrong
I must insist that it shall or shall not be done, because
I feel responsible before God.' This would seem strange
Constitutional doctrine, and it is also doubtful whether the
Almighty draws a distinction between domestic and external
affairs as such. Confronted with the Royal refusal Venizelos
wished to resign, but he withdrew his resignation under
pressure from the King, and at the same time invited the
Allies to send troops to the rescue of Serbia through Salonika.
Ever afterwards Venizelos swore that Constantine had con-
sented to this, and ever afterwards Constantine swore to
the contrary. The Allied troops arrived at Salonika, and
Venizelos in his struggle with the King was forced to protest
against their disembarkation. Simultaneously, however, he
made a speech to the Chamber claiming publicly for the
first time that the Greco-Serbian Treaty imposed an absolute
obligation upon Greece to make war on Bulgaria and Turkey,
Though still supported by a majority in the Chamber, he
was dismissed from ofi&ce by the King.

The third phase of the dispute between King and Minister
was armed revolt. Venizelos in September 1916 quitted
Greece for Crete, where he set up a Provisional Government.
Thence he descended upon Salonika, where a Revolutionary
government had already been instituted. Here he raised a
Greek army in support of the AUies. The accession of the
United States to the Allied cause produced a strong effect
upon Greek public opinion. There was less dread even in
Royalist circles of being left at the end of the war on the side
of a beaten England in the face of a triumphant and remorse-
less Germany and revengeful Bulgaria. In June 1917, every-
one being desperate, and the Greek situation increasingly
favourable, the French, with keen British approval, occu-
pied Athens and drove Constantine into exile. From that
moment Venizelos controlled again the fortunes of Greece,
and from that moment Greece shared the fortunes of the
Allies. Greek divisions fought on the Salonika front ; Greek

GREEK TRAGEDY 383

warships joined the Allied Fleet ; Allied munitions and
credits flowed into Greece during the war, and Venizelos
carried his country to the Council Board of the victors after
the Armistice. His personal qualities, his prestige, the
famous services he had rendered the Allies, secured him a
position almost of equality with the heads of the greatest
victorious states; and with him, his country moimted
to dizzy heights and surveyed dazzling horizons.

Meanwhile Constantine brooded in exile, and the Greek
politicians, who, if they had had their way, would have kept
their coimtry out of all share in the victory or indeed involved
it in defeat, awaited morosely the hour of revenge.

, * * * 4e

If had seemed in Paris that the policy of Britain, France
and the United States would be to develop substantially
the power and extent of Greece. They certainly showed
themselves ready to use her. We have seen how Greek
divisions were called upon to accompany the French in their
ignominious incursion into the Ukraine; how they were
authorized and encouraged to overrun and occupy Thrace ;
and above all, how they were launched into the fatal descent
upon Sm3rma. Venizelos had shown himself more than apt
to obey these high commands; and although the Greek
armies had been mobilized almost continuoudy for ten years,
they seemed at this time to be the only troops who would
go an37where or do anjrthing. Thus by the summer of
1919 the Greek forces were widely spread and deeply com-
mitted on Turkish soil. Venizelos returning to Athens in
December was received with enthusiasm ; but signs of strain
— ^social, military and economic — were already to be dis-
cerned in the structure of this small State and people.

When in 1920, in the advent of the Treaty of Sevres,
Sir Henry Wilson and I expressed the British rdliteiry view
upon the Greek situation, the Prime Minister asked us to
see Venizdos ourselves and to lay before him our misgivings.
This we did with candour, asking such questions as : How
much is it costing you a day ? How long have the soldiers
been away from their families ? What prospect is there of
a real peace with Turkey? and so on. We pointed out
that though, or even if, the Greek troops could beat the

The General
Victory.

384 THE WORLD CRISIS : the aftermath

Commit- Turks in th.eir present condition in battle, this would mean
and for him no extrication from his danger. The Kemalist

Smyrna. Turks, a handful of ragged warriors fighting under barbaric
conditions, could compel the maintenance of very large
numbers of organized troops on a war footing overseas at
heavy expense for an indefinite period. ' It is costing them
nothing, but how long can you keep it up ? ' Venizelos
rejoined that the Greek troops stood where they were in
response to the requests of Lloyd George, Clemenceau and
President Wilson. He admitted the inequality of the war-
fare, but professed his confidence that with the support of
the three greatest Powers he would reach a satisfactory and
final conclusion. Almost immediately after this discussion
he occupied Thrace, capturing or dispersing the two weak
Turkish divisions which were stiU. in the province, and
entered Adrianople. We were agreeably surprised by these
events, but by no means relieved from our general anxieties.
There followed the Treaty of Sfevres.

A similar swift success had attended the northward
advance of the Greek forces from the Smyrna Province to
drive away the Turks who were molesting the French and
British lines across the Ismid Peninsula. Although both
Foch and Wilson had advised against it, this operation was
executed by two Greek divisions with ease and celerity, and
with results extremely gratifying to the British, French
and American pohtical chiefs. There is no doubt that
these episodes aroused in Mr. Lloyd George's mind a con-
fidence in Greek military power agreeable to his inclinations.
The result however was only to spread the Greek forces
over wider areas and burden them with heavier responsibil-
ities. So long as Greece was acting as the capable and will-
ing assistant and informal mandatory of the three greatest
Powers, there was a solid and, if need be, an ample backing
bdiind her far-spread lines. But now there occurred one
of those apparitions of the unexpected without which no
Greek tragedy could unfold itself.

The Treaty of Sfevres was signed on August 10, 1920.
Venizelos arrived in Athens in September, bringing home with
him for the fourth time in his career the immense gains of
triumphant war and policy. The admiration of the wdoom-

GREEK TRAGEDY 385

ing crowds was stimulated by his narrow escape a few weeks
before from murder in a Paris railway station. He had
carried his country, largely in spite of herself, to the highest
pinnacle she has ever scaled in modem times. Great stakes
were still on the board, entangling commitments stiU gripped
the armies and finances of Greece ; but there seemed no
reason why, sustained by the aid of the mightiest nations
and their renowned leaders, the problems of the future
should prove more formidable than those Venizelos had
already successfully surmounted in the past.

When in June 1917 King Constantine had been driven
into exile by the imperious finger of M. Jonnart, the French
High Commissioner, supported by French Marines and
Allied naval power, his second son Alexander had been set
up in his stead. This amiable youth, the victim of fate as
weU as of policy, had reigned for more than three years.
Before the world storm swept him to the throne he had fallen
in love with an attractive young lady, MUe M&.nos, the
daughter of a small Court ofl&cial whose family history was
by regal standards not particularly impressive. King Alex-
ander would never have hesitated for a moment in a choice
between his love and his throne ; and since his morganatic
marriage with Mile M^os in November 1919, Venizelos had
had to face a series of delicate and embarrassing political
issues on this account. However, the statesman S3mi-
pathized profoundly with the yormg couple, and amid the
labours and excitements of treaty-making and the dark but
distant clouds that lowered upon the Greek fronts, he made
skilful exertions on their behalf. Constitutional niceties
were in a fair way to adjustment, and at the time of Veni-
zelos’s home-coming it seemed that within the widened
botmdaries of the new Greek Empire there might weE be
room for a royal romance.

On October 3 , 1920, King Alexander, walking in the garden
accompanied by his spaniel, paused to watch the antics of
a pair of monkeys comprised among the less disciplined
pets of the royal Palace. The spaniel attacked the female
monkey, and the male in retaliation attacked the Fling. It
bit him in the leg. The wound, though peculiarly painful,
was not judged serious by the ph3rsicians. But the bite

BB

The Young
King.

386 THE WORLD CRISIS : the aftermath

The Mon- festered, inflammation became acute, more dangerous

key’s Bite. s3miptoms supervened, and after three weeks of agony King
Alexander expired in the arms of his bride who might soon
have become his Consort.

We have already seen how the escape of a single capital
ship, the Goelen, spread measureless desolation through the
south-east of Europe and through Asia Minor. It is per-
haps no exaggeration to remark that a quarter of a million
persons died of this monkey’s bite.

The Greek Constitution did not specifically prescribe that
a General Election should follow a demise of the Crown;
but the question of a successor was embarrassing. Venizelos
seems to have toyed with the idea of crowning the infant
son of Mile M^nos, with a consequential prolonged regency.
It was however eventually decided to offer the throne to
Prince Paul of Greece. Paul was living in Switzerland
Tmder the roof of his exiled father, and no doubt was inspired
to reply that he could only accept after the Greek people
had at an election definitely decided against both his father
and his elder brother. Prince George. This forced a General
Election.

Venizelos in no way shirked the issue. Buoyed by the
evidences of his popularity and by the conviction that he
had deserved well of the Greek people, he was willing that
the issue should be put cradely to the electorate : Were
they for the restoration of Constantine or not ? It followed
from this that all the supporters of the ex-King were free
to return from exile or retirement and take an active part
in the election. It might well have seemed that there could
not be much doubt about the public choice upon the issue
' Constantine versus Venizelos ’ at a moment when the
former was stultified and the latter vindicated by world
events. But the imperious Cretan did not make sufficient
allowances for the strain to which his small country had
been put ; for the resentments which the Allied Blockade
to make Greece enter the war had deeply planted ; for
the many discontents which arise under prolonged war
conditions; for the oppressive conduct of many of his
agents ; for the complete absorption of his political
oppon^ts in party politics and for thdr intense desire

GREEK TRAGEDY

387

for office and revenge. During his enforced and con- The Greek
tinuous absence in Paris and London, the Greek people
had lacked his personal inspiration and had felt the heavy
hands of his subordinates. No one of authority in Greece
or out of it seemed to doubt that a substantial Venizelist
majority would be returned. But the election results which
came in during the evening of November 14 were a staggering
surprise for all. Venizelos himself was unseated, and his
followers commanded only 114 seats against an opposition
of 250. Greek Party Politics are conducted in a high-pitched
key. Venizelos at once announced that he would resign and
leave the country; and he remained unmoved even by
the poignant argument that he would be accused of running
away and leaving his friends to be massacred. He declared
that his presence could only be a cause of rmrest and disorder.

He placed his resignation in the hands of his old friend
Admiral Condouriotis, indicated his successor, and quitted
Greece for Italy on November 17 in a friend’s yacht. Thus
incontinently did the Greek people at the moment of their
greatest hopes and fears deprive themselves of the command-
ing personality who had created the situation and by whom
alone it might have been carried to success.

I happened to be with Mr. Lloyd George in the Cabinet
Room at the time the telegram announcing the results of
the Greek election and Venizelos’s decision arrived. He was
very much shocked, and still more puzzled. But with his
natural buoyancy, and hardened by the experiences we had
all passed through in the Great War, he contented himself
with remarking, with a grin, ‘ Now I am the only one left.’^

The reactions of the fall of Venizelos must be closely
studied by those who wish to follow the chain of events.

Greece, though only a small state beset with difficulties and
foes, indulged the dangerous luxury of a dual nature.

There was the pro-Ally Greece of Venizelos and the pro-
German Greece of Constantine. All the loyalties of the
Allies began and ended with the Greece of Venizelos. All
their resentments centred upon the Greece of Constantine.

The ex-King was a bugbear second only to the Kaiser himself

1 President Wilson had been struck down by illness, Clemenceau
had retired, and Orlando had been defeated.

Fall of
Venizelos :
Its

Reactions.

388 THE WORLD CRISIS : the aftermath

in the eyes of the British and French peoples, and he ranked
in Allied estimation with the so-called ‘ Foxy ' Ferdinand
of Bulgaria. Here was a potentate who, as we saw it,
against the wishes and the interests of his people, had for
personal and family reasons thrown his country, or tried to
throw it, on the enemy side, which had also turned out
to be the losing side. It would be absurd to ask the British
or French democracy to make sacrifices or efforts for a people
whose real spirit was shown by their choice of such a man.
The return of Constantine therefore dissolved all Allied
loyalties to Greece and cancelled aU but legal obhgations.
In England, the feeling ■was not resentment, but a total
extinction of S3nnpathy or even interest. In France, a
stronger displeasure was reinforced by other practical
considerations. We have seen how the French were involved
in difficulties ■with the Arabs in Syria and ■with the Turks in
Cilicia. For the sake of Venizelos much had to be endured,
but for Constantine less than nothing. Indeed, after the
first astonishment had worn off an air of relief became
manifest in controlling circles. There was no need any
more to pursue an anti-Turkish policy. On the contrary,
good relations ■with Turkey would be most conducive to
French interests. The situation in the Levant could be
relieved, and other positive advantages presented themselves.
If Greece was free, everyone was free. Greece had in fact
become a Liberator. Just at the moment when her needs
were greatest and her commitments were becoming most
embarrassing to herself and to others, she had of her o'wn
free "will sponged the slate. It is not every day that moral
creditors are so accommodating.

Lord Curzon, voicing the cool and dispassionate ■view of
the Foreign Office, proposed a conditional support of Greece
and even the recognition of Constantine ; but the Allied
Conference which met in Paris on December 3 brushed such
plans aside. The three Great Powers informed the Greek
Government that ' although they had not ■wished to interfere
in the internal affairs of Greece, the restoration to the
throne of a King whose disloyal attitude and conduct to'wards
the Allies during the War caused them great embarrassment
and loss, could only be regarded by them as a ratification

GREEK TRAGEDY 389

by Greece of Hs hostile acts ’ ; that ' this step would create
a new and unfavourable situation in the relations between
Greece and the Allies ’ ; and that ‘ the three Governments
reserved to themselves in that case complete liberty in
dealing with the situation thus created.' And on the next
day they declared in a second note that 'if Constantine
returned to the throne, Greece would receive no further
financial assistance of any kind from the Allies.’

In the teeth of this declaration, but much intimidated
by the victorious monarchists, the Greeks by an almost
unanimous plebiscite voted for the recall of Constantine.
At the end of December King Constantine and Queen Sophie
and their children re-entered Athens, amid the same demon-
strative rejoicings of the populace as had recently saluted
Venizelos. Meanwhile the new Government busied them-
selves in expelling from every form of public emplo3?ment
all Venizelist of&cials, from Bishops, judges, university pro-
fessors, and schoolmasters, down even to the charwomen
in the public oflBLces. The Allied Ministers remained in
Athens under instructions to carry on formal relations with
the Government, but to ignore the King, the Royal Family,
and the Court. Henceforward Greece, riven internally, was
to face her perils alone.

The only rational object in expelling Venizelos and the
only sane policy arising from it would have been to reduce
promptly and ruthlessly the Greek commitments in Asia
Minor. It was arguable that the great Cretan had ridden
his small cormtry too hard ; certainly it had thrown him
during the triumphal procession. Now, stripped of British
support and confronted by Italian rivalries, and by what
was soon to become marked French antagonism, one course
alone was open to Constantine and his Ministers. Peace
with Turkey on the best terms obtainable ; the swift
abandonment of every position in Asia Minor ; the repatria-
tion and demobilization of the armies ; and the most drastic
financial economies, were the logical and inevitable con-
sequences of the decision which the Greek people had been
invited to take and which they had taken. But these were
the very decisions which the new regime was least inclined
to take. They were in temper more expansionist than

Return of
Constantine.

Isolation of
Greece.

390 THE WORLD CRISIS : the aftermath

Venizelos himself. The military and political circles which
rallied round the Court pulsated with ambition. They would
now show Greece how little Venizelos had had to do with
her successes. The idea that they should give up what had
been so surprisingly gained was intolerable to their pride as
it would have been fatal to their popularity. They proposed
on the contrary to receive extensions of Greek territory in
Asia Minor beyond anything Venizelos had deemed possible :
they adopted the cry of " To Constantinople ” to express
their ultimate goal. Thus, when the Allies met in Paris
on February 21, 192X, with timely if harsh resolve to revise
the Treaty of Sfevres, particularly in respect of Smyrna
and Thrace, the new Greek Government rejected their pro-
posals and declared that Greece was herself capable of hold-
ing unaided the territories awarded her by the Treaty. At
this moment, Greece was maintaining 200,000 troops in
Asia Minor at a cost of at least a quarter of a million a
week. The Turks, in friendly negotiation with the French
and encouraged by a Treaty with Moscow, were growing
constantly and rapidly in numbers and fighting power.

Only pity must be felt for the mass of the Greek people at
this point in their history. They were set tasks beyond
their strength ; they were asked questions which they
were not competent to answer ; they had no knowledge
of the consequences inherent in the decisions they were
led to take. They had endured a longer strain of war,
mobilization, and war government than almost any
other people in a war-wearied world. They were tom and
baffled by faction ; there were two hostile nations in the
bosom of one small harassed state ; and even under these
distracting conditions their armies maintained for a long
period remarkable discipline and constancy. They were now
to be launched upon an adventure at once more ambitious
and more forlorn than any which we have yet described.

* )it * « *

The third act of the Greek Tragedy must begin with a
description of the attitude of some personalities in British
politics. Being in complete disagreement with Mr. Lloyd
George on Turco-Greek afiairs, but preserving always an
intimate and free intercourse with him, I on more than
one occasion during these years invited him to state the

GREEK TRAGEDY

391

foundations of his poKcy. He declared them, with hig usual Mr. Lloyd
good humour and tolerance of the opinion of a colleague, *

in these terms, and more or less in these words. ‘ The
Greeks are the people of the future in the Eastern
Mediterranean. They are prolific and full of energy.

They represent Christian civilization against Turkish bar-
barism. Their fighting power is grotesquely underrated
by our generals. A greater Greece will be an invaluable
advantage to the British Empire. The Greeks by tradition,
inclination, and interest are friendly to us ; they are now a
nation of five or six millions, and in fifty years, if they can
hold the territories which have been assigned to them, they
will be a nation of twenty millions. They are good sailors ;
they will develop a naval power ; they will possess all the
most important islands in the Eastern Mediterranean.

These islands are the potential submarine bases of the
future ; they lie on the fl.ank of our communications through
the Suez Canal with India, the Far East, and Australasia.

The Greeks have a strong sense of gratitude, and if we are
the statmch friends of Greece at the period of her national
expansion she will become one of the guarantees by which
the main intercommimications of the British Empire can
be preserved. One day the mouse may gnaw the cords
that bind the lion.’ To which I replied in effect and at
suitable intervals, ‘ If this is so, what are you going to do
about it ? You have no armies which can be sent ; you
are always sa3dng there is no money which can be spared ;
you have no public opinion which will support you. The
Conservative party is the traditional friend of Turkey. The
bias of your majority is pro-Turk ; the bias of your Cabinet is
pro-Turk ; the bias of your generals is pro-Turk. We are the
greatest Mohammedan power in the world. Very deep
oppositions will arise to any prolonged anti-Tmkish or pro-
Greek policy. Moreover, the Ttirks are very dangerous,
because they are both fierce and unget-at-able. If the
Greeks try to conquer Turkey they wiU be ruined, and now
that Constantine has come back you will never be allowed to
help them effectively.’ I cannot pretend that this records
the dialogue, but it is in my opinion a fair representation
of two different points of view.

Lord Curzon’s line was broadly that a very cool, circum-

Curzon and
Montagu,

392 THE WORLD CRISIS : the aftermath

spect, but not unhelpful policy should be adopted towards
the Greeks ; that a friendly peace should be made with
Turkey ; but that at all costs the Turks should be expelled
from Europe and Constantinople. Mr. Montagu, supported
by aU the forces which represent India, was for peace with
Turkey on almost any terms ; England should be the friend
and head of the Moslem world; and above aU, Con-
stantinople should be restored to the Turks. The Cabinet,
as has been described, resolved against the Prime Minister
and Lord Curzon upon Constantinople, and both these
Ministers accepted the decision. But upon action, either
to help the Greeks or to pacify the Turks, no coherent
policy could be formulated, except the purely negative one
of using neither British troops nor money and waiting upon
events. This stagnation and arrest lasted for nearly two
years, from the faU of Venizelos to the crisis of Chanak.

But we are here concerned with the fortunes of the Greeks.
There is no doubt that under the restored Constantine they
made an intense and persevering national effort. Had they
enjoyed the support in credit, munitions, and goodwill of
the Great Powers, no one can say for certain that they
could not have enforced a peace upon the Kemalist Turks,
which would have secured them Thrace and a footing in
Sm5nna. Without any of these aids they now proceeded
to seek this peace at Angora with the sword.

The question from which so many heartburnings and
reproaches have arisen, is whether the British Prime Minister
gave them personal and tmwarranted encouragement in this
enterprise. It is quite certain that according to all the
canons of ofiELcial diplomacy they received no encouragement
from His Majesty's Government. They assuredly were
warned and discouraged on every opportunity and through
every available channel by the British War Of&ce and
General Staff. But of course they knew that the Prime
Minister’s heart was with them and that he ardently
desired their victory. Lloyd George was the only Eng-
lishman known in Greece, and he appeared to their eyes
as the successor of Canning and Gladstone. His achieve-
ments in the Great War, his prestige in Europe, his
unquestioned mastery at the time in England, his own

GREEK TRAGEDY

393

resourcefulness and will power, his known and evident
partisanship, created in Greek minds a sense of vague but
potent confidence. Although, thought they, nothing definite
has been said and no agreement has been made, the great
man is with us, and in his own way and in his own time and
by his own wizardry he will bring us the vital aidw^e need.

Now this was the worst of aU possible situations. The
Greeks deserved at the least either to be backed up through
thick and thin with the moral, diplomatic and financial
support of a united British Government, or to be chilled to
the bone with repeated douches of cold water. But all sorts
of other things, Ireland, for instance, and British party
disturbances, were in progress at the same time. So much
was going on in the world, and difficulties so abounded, that
the affairs of one small country about which such differences
of opinion arose were only considered spasmodically as events
happened, and even then without any clear decision emerg-
ing. After all, Constantine and his Government had acted
on their own responsibility. They were entitled to form
their own view of what the eventual action of any of the
Great Powers towards their enterprise would be ; but they
alone were the party who had to decide, and it was their
skins in the first place that were at stake. The sentimental
support of an eminent man may be a powerful encourage-
ment, but it is no substitute for treaties, agreements, or
formal diplomatic communications.

However, on June ii King Constantine in person assumed
the command at Sm3rma, and in July the fourth Greek attack
upon the Turks in Asia Minor began.

Hi iUfi * ^

I feel entitled at this point to set forth my own view and
action. I have been freely represented as the advocate of
violent policies in every quarter and on every occasion, and
so far I have never attempted any detailed explanation of
my course. Lord Curzon's able biographer, with the fullest
knowledge of the official archives and much freedom in their
use, has suggested not obscurely that the words ' firebrand '
and ' warmonger ' may be justly applied to me in this
connexion. I shall therefore make the facts plain.

I must begin by reminding the reader of the general state-

Unofficial

Encourage-

ment.

394 the world CRISIS : the aftermath

ment of policy set forth by the General Staff upoh my
authority in December 1919, which has been summarized
in Chapter XVII ; and secondly, to my letter to the Prime
Minister of March 1920 printed on page 377. The following
are the views which I put on record on February 22, 1921,
at the time of the Allied Conference upon the revision of the
Treaty of Sevres, and again on June ii, 1921, before the
Greeks started their march to Angora : —

Mr. Churchill to the Prime Minister

Feb. 22, 1921.

I did not want to renew the argument about policy this
morning. You have the power to decide the British policy,
and I can only wait anxiously for the results. The kind
of people whose opinions on the questions at 'issue ought
to weigh with you are the following : The Viceroy and
Government of India : George Lloyd, the Governor of
Bombay ; the Viceroy-Designate of India ; Ld AUenby
and Sir Percy Cox : the officials of the new Middle-Eastern
Department, Mr. Shuckburgh, Col. Lawrence, Major Young :
the General Staff, in all its branches and representatives :
the High Commissioner at Constantinople and Gen. Haring-
ton : Montagu, with his special position and knowledge :
true and proved friends of Britain hke the Aga Khan. I
have yet to meet a British official personage who does not
think that our Eastern and Middle-Eastern affairs would be
enormously eased and helped by arriving at a peace with
Turkey. The alternative of the renewal of war causes me
the deepest misgivings. I dare say the Greeks may scatter
the Turkish Nationalists on their immediate front, and may
penetrate some distance into Turkey ; but the more coun-
try they hold, and the longer they remain in it, the more
costly to them. The reactions from this state of affairs
fall mainly upon us, and to a lesser extent on the French.
They are all unfavourable. The Turks will be thrown into
the arms of the Bolsheviks ; Mesopotamia wiU be disturbed
at the critical period of the reduction of the Army there ;
it wiU probably be quite impossible to hold Mosul and
Bagdad without a powerful and expensive army ; the
general alienation of Mohammedan sentiment from Great
Britaiu will continue to work evil consequences in every
direction ; the French and Itahans will make their own
explanations ; and we shall be ever3rwhere represented as
the chief enemy of Islam. Further misfortunes will fall
upon the Armenians.

GREEK TRAGEDY

395

In these circumstances it seems to me a feaifol responsi- June
bility to let loose the Greeks and. to reopen the war, I
am deeply grieved at the prospect, and at finding myself
so utterly without power to influence your mind even in
regard to matters with which my duties are specially con-
cerned. All the more am I distressed because of my desire
to aid you in any way open to me in the many matters
in which we are agreed, and because of our long friendship
and my admiration for your genius and work.

In the early part of June the Prime Minister held a con-
ference at Chequers, at which we agreed in principle upon
putting pressure equally upon both sides to come to a
settlement.

Mr. Churchill to the Prime Minister

June II, 1921.

I have had a talk this morning with Venizelos. I ex-
plained to him the conclusions of our conference at Chequers,
and he was in agreement with them. I agree with you
that we should say to Constantine — ' Here are the terms
which we think should be offered to Kemal now. If you
accept them we will put them before Kemal, if possible
in conjunction with France. We should tell Kemal that if
he refuses them, we shall help the Greeks in every possible
way, and that if the Greeks gain a success the terms will
have to be altered proportionately to Kemal’s disadvantage.'
We should further tell Constantine that he should dday
his offensive until he has reorganized his army by the rein-
statement of competent Venizelist Generals. If he agrees
with all that we ask of him, both in the matter of the terms
to the Turks and in the matter of reorganizing the army,
and if Kemal continues obdurate so that the arrangements
with Constantine actually come into effect, we should not
hesitate to jrecognize him. If unhappily we are forced to
work with this man and with the Greeks, there is no sense
in not doing everything possible to secure success. Half-
measures and half-hearted support have been the bane of
all the policy we have pursued, whether towards Russia or
Turkey, since the Armistice, and they have conducted us
to our present disastrous position.

As to the terms, I think they must include the evacua-
tion of Smyrna by the Greek Army. I do not think any-
thing less than that gives a fair chance of wiiming French
co-operation or of procuring Kemalist agreement. The
question of the guarantees to be taken either by a local
force or by an international force for the protection of the

June 25.

396 THE WORLD CRISIS : the aftermath

lives of the Christians need not be finally decided at this stage,
but I agree with you that effective guarantees must be
obtained to prevent massacre.

I do not think there is any time to lose. If the Greeks
go ofi on another half-cock offensive, the last card will have
been played and lost and we shall neither have a Turkish
peace nor a Greek army.

In taking the line I am now doing on the Greco-Turkish
problem, I am sure you will understand that my view as
to the objective at which we are aiming has never altered.
It has always been and it is still, the making of a peace
with Turkey which shall be a real peace and one achieved
at the earliest possible moment. I entirely disagree, as
you know and as I have repeatedly placed on record, with
the whole policy of the Treaty of Sevres, and the results
which have arisen from it have been those which I have
again and again ventured to predict. But in the difficult
situation in which we now stand I am doing my utmost
to find a way out of our embarrassments which will not
leave us absolutely defenceless before an exultant and
unreasonable antagonist.

And again by official minute of June 25, 1921 : —

Prime Minister.

Lord Curzon.

June 25, 1921.

If it be true, as seems probable from the newspapers,
that the Greeks are going to refuse our offer of mediation,
I do earnestly hope we shall not hesitate to make our
policy effective. If they go on against the wishes of Eng-
land and France and without any moral support, and get
beaten or at the very best entangled, our affairs will suffer
terribly, as we shall have an absolutely unreasonable Kemal
to deal with. I am sure the path of courage is the path of
safety. The Prime Minister said the other day at Cabinet
that he would agree to any even-handed policy as regards
the two sides. I think we should ask the French whether
they will join with us in letting the Greeks know that unless
they put themselves in out hands as we suggested, we shall
definitely intervene to stop the war by blockading Smyrna
to Greek ships. This threat is bound to be decisive, as
what can they do ? Nor will it cost us an3rthing, as the
Mediterranean Fleet is overwhehningly strong and is in the
Mediterranean already. I think everybody here would
approve of our stopping the war. As the counterpart to this,
we should make it dear to the Greeks that if they do put
themselves in our hands and Eemal is unreasonable we

GREEK TRAGEDY

397

will give them effective support, including the full use of
the naval blockade weapon against the Turks.

I am deeply alarmed at the idea of the Greeks starting
off in a disheartened manner on this new offensive. It
may produce irretrievable disaster if it fails. It simply
means that all the policy we agreed upon at Chequers comes
to nought. I may add that if the French dechne to par-
ticipate in the naval blockade, either of Greece or Turkey
as the case may be, I should still be in favour of oxir going
on alone, as we are fuHy possessed of the means to do aU
that is necessary and to do it quite quickly.

However, the Greek Army was already marching steadily
forward through harsh and difficult country to engage in
the greatest campaign undertaken by Greece since classic
times. This episode deserves a more detailed description
than it has usually received.

Before the initial movements the Greeks were assembled
in two groups.^ The right or southern, consisting of seven
divisions and a cavalry brigade (33.000 rifles and 1,000
sabres), concentrated near Ushak on the railway; the left
or northern, of four divisions (about 18,000 rifles) gathered
at Brusa. The interval of about forty miles between these
two important forces was covered by a line of posts which
stretched from the coast of the Marmora to the south of
Sm3nma. The Turks were also arranged in two groups:
the Northern of six divisions and three cavalry divisions,
comprising 33,000 rifles (the cavalry being mounted infantry)
between Eskishehr on the railway and the Marmora ; and
the Southern group of ten divisions and two cavalry divi-
sions, comprising 35,000 rifles, the greater part around
Kutaya on the railway, but extending as far as Afium
Karahissar and beyond. The Greeks were slightly superior
in numbers — ^51,000 against 48,000. They had also an
advantage of three to two in guns and eight to three in
Tnarbine guns, and were better provided with aeroplanes
and technical stores. The Turks had however another
three divisions (8,000 rifles) in reserve behind Angora, and
two divisions (5,000 rifles) to the south-east in Cilicia, and
three more divisions and two cavalry divisions (6,500
rifles) 170 miles east of Angora in the Amasia area.

1 See Plan on page 399 and the General Map of Turkey facing p. 438.

The Greek
Advance.

The Battle
of Eski-
shehr.

398 THE WORLD CRISIS : the aftermath

The Greek object was to destroy the Turkish Army and
to occupy Angora, but as the Smyma-Angora railway,
which was the only railway line available for the campaign,
departing from its general east and west direction, ran
roughly north and south behind the Turkish front between
Afium Karahissar and Eskishehr, it was necessary as a
first step to drive the Turks from this sector, annihilating
th p-pi if possible, before the advance on Angora could
be executed. The operations were begun by a feint.

On July 9 the Greek left group moved 2 divisions east-
ward from Brusa to hold the Turkish northern group to its
position, whilst the other a marched south-eastward towards
Kutaya to co-operate with the right wing of the army.
Three days later 3 divisions of the Greek right group attacked
the Turks at Afium Karahissar and defeated them. The
clearing of the railway to Eskishehr was now begun. Leav-
ing one division at Afium Karahissar, the rest of the right
group and the a divisions of the left which had come south-
ward closed on Kutaya, drove off the Turks and entered
it on the 17th. The Turks retreated on and beyond Eski-
shehr, which the Greeks occupied on the 20th. King
Constantine reached the front on this day from Athens to
take command in person. On the aist the Tmrks made
a general attack. They were counter-attacked and re-
pulsed all along the line, and retired 30 miles on a position
behind the Sakaria river, 50 miles from Angora and cover-
ing the approach to their capital.

The Greeks had gained a strategic and tactical success ;
they had gained possession of the railway for the further
advance ; but they had not destroyed the Turkish army
or any part of it. The losses on both sides in killed and
wounded were about the same, 7,000 to 8,000 ; but the
Turks had in addition lost 4,000 prisoners.

A short pause followed during which both armies reor-
ganized and prepared themselves for the next phase. The
Greeks improved their rail and road communications. They
repaired their rolling-stock and strengthened their road
transport by collecting about 500 lorries, 2,000 camels and
3,000 ox-carts. Mustapha Kemal, poorer at all points than
his opponents in transport and supply, called upon the

BATTLE OF ESKlSHEHR-Jiily9th.to 20tb. 192t

Railways^ ‘fMtznnrK Turkish fortified postthns,

ss=s=ss=s Principal Poadd.? Original Greek front

Rivers* ^ Une of aduance of each Greek Division shewing dates

on which positions indicated were reached.

Tlie Battle
of the
Sakaria.

400 THE WORLD CRISIS: the aftermath

wives and daughters of his soldiers to do the work of the
camels and oxen which he lacked. During the luU files
of Turkish women carried food and water and other sup-
plies from innumerable villages, and concentrated them
to the east of the great bend in the Sakaria river
on which their national guide and ruler had resolved to
stand.

The Greeks resumed the advance on August 10, after
detaching a second division to the Afium Karahissar
front. They had now a total force of 73,000 rifles, of which

50.000 were available for the offensive. The Turks had

70.000 rifles, of which 44,000 were assembled on the Sakaria
river, but 8,000 more from Cilicia were approaching by
rail and march. Unmoved by the Greek success at Eski-
shehr, the Alhes at Paris decided on the 14th to maintain
neutrality.

Battle was joined on the 24th. The Greek plan had
originedly been to turn the Turkish position from the south,
but at the last moment as the Turks were shifting men
from their right to the left, a change was made and it was
decided to break the Turkish centre in the direction of
Yapan Hamman. Nevertheless it was on the southern
flank that the first and most progress was made, and this
enabled the centre and left to get forward. In ten days
of fighting, during which their line of communications was
raided by the Turks, and they suffered from want of ammu-
nition, food and even water, the Greeks gradually pressed
the Turks back some ten miles, and but for the failure of
the administrative arrangements would probably have
inflicted on them the signal defeat which was confidently
expected. But by September 4 their effort was exhausted ;
both sides indeed had fought practically to a standstill
and had used up all their reserves. The fighting had
been fierce and bloody. The Greeks had lost 18,000 men,
the Turks not quite so many but again many prisoners.
Both armies were in being, nearly equal in numbers, and
after rest fit to continue the contest. But the Greeks had
involved themselves in a politico-strategic situation where
an3dhing short of decisive victory was defeat : and the
Tmks were in a position where anything diort of ovmt-

GREEK TRAGEDY

401

cc

A Further
Oppor-
tunity.

402 THE WORLD CRISIS : the aftermath

wLelming defeat was victory. No aspect of this was
hidden from the warrior-chief who led the Turks.

Until September 9 both sides were busy reorganizing;
but on that day Kemal after being in doubt as to whether
the Greeks were merely resting, preparing for a fresh attack,
or retiring, came to the conclusion their offensive had come
to an end, and ordered a general counter-attack.

The Greeks resisted stubbornly with success, but the
strategic situation was too perilous and on the evening of
September ii King Constantine decided to retire to the
west of the Sakaria river. The withdrawal was skilfully
executed ; but it proclaimed the failure of the Greek
campaign. The armies remained in presence astride the
railway on a Line running south from Eskishehr.

* * * * *

Now again there was a chance for intervention. I
circulated the following printed Memorandum : —

Greece and Turkey

September 26, 1921.

The serious reverse which the Greeks have sustained in
their attempt to take Angora should add another to the
long series of opportunities which have occurred for making
a good settlement in the East. It will indeed be disgraceful
if we do not make a real effort now to secure such a settle-
ment. The waste and ruin by which the whole of this part
of the East is ravaged and its reaction upon the general
impoverishment of the world is in itself a sufficient reason.

Is it not, therefore, the very moment now for decided
intervention to secure a settlement, whether for the sake
of Greece or for the sake of Turkey ? It may well be that
this further spell of bloody and disappointing fighting may
have induced the wish for peace on both sides. Mustapha
Kemal may no longer be in the unreasonable mood in which
the Bekir Sami negotiations were conducted, and the Greeks
must be getting nearer and nearer to bankruptcy and revo-
lution. Now is the time to address ourselves to both sides
in the mood which we had reached before the Greek resump-
tion of the offensive. No doubt the terms proposed would
have to be remodelled. But having decided ourselves what
we think is reasonable, we ought to press upon both sides
to the utmost hmit of our force, not excluding a blockade
of the Piraeus if Greece is unreasonable, or direct assistance
in money and supplies to her if Turkey is unreasonable.

GREEK TRAGEDY

403

We seem to have done absolutely nothing during the last
three months but watch the progress of this disastrous con-
flict, and if we continue in this attitude we sh all certainly
find ourselves formidably disturbed in Mesopotamia.

But nothing was done, and for a while nothing happened-
We entered a period of false c alm . There was a pause
in the march of events ; an interlude in discussion ; a gap
in policy. The next chapter will explain how the gap
was fiUed : but before the final blows are struck, it will
be convenient to outline however briefly the subsidiary
Armenian Tragedy which accompanied the revival of the
Turkish power.

* * )k * Ik

The events which have been described in Russia and in
Turkey, and which were soon to be ratified by new disasters,
were fatal to the Armenian people. The Great War had
carried them through hideous slaughters to the fairest and
broadest hope they had ever known ; and then abruptly
laid them — ^it may well be for ever — ^in the dust. The
age-long misfortunes of the Armenian race have arisen
mainly from the physical structure of their home. Upon
the lofty tableland of Armenia, stretching across the base
of the Asia Minor Peninsula, are imposed a series of moimtain
ranges having a general direction east and west. The valleys
between these mountains have from time immemorial been
the pathways of every invasion or 'counter-attack between
Asia Minor in the west and Persia and Central Asia in the
east. In antiquity the Medes, the Persians, the Romans ;
in the early centuries of the Christian Era the Persian
Sassanids and Eastern Roman Emperors ; and in the
Middle Ages successive waves of Mongols and Turks —
Seljukli and Osmanli — ^invaded, conquered, partitioned,
yielded and reconquered the rugged regions in which an
ill-starred race strove ceaselessly for life and independence.
And after the rise of Russia to power the struggle for posses-
sion of the Armenian regions, as containing the natural
frontiers of their own domains, was continued by Russia,
Persia and the Ottoman Empire,

At the moment when the Great War began Armenia,
divided between Russia and Turkey, repressed by force or

Armenia
and the
Pan-Turks.

Armenia
and the
Pan-Turks.

404 THE WORLD CRISIS : the aftermath

actual massacre, had no defence but secret societies and
no weapons but intrigue and assassination. The War drew
upon them a new train of evils. After the Balkan Wars
the Pan-Turks cast away both ‘ Ottomanization ’ and
‘ Turkification ’ as means for recreating the State. They
attributed the disasters which the Turkish Empire had
sustained in part to the opposition of the non-Turkish
races in their midst. In blunt but significant language
they concluded that these races ‘ were not worth consider-
ing ; they were worse than encumbrances ; they could go
to the devil.’ The re-created State for which patriotic
Turks hoped must be formed by Turks alone. The
goal, if attainable, could be reached only by a long road
and a hard. The sooner therefore the Turkish people set
out upon it in deadly earnest, the better. The Turks
took this road from 1912 onwards; and the fact that
they had done so went long unrecognized in Europe. The
Armenians were, however, better informed. They saw
that the incorporation of the Moslem areas of Caucasia in
a great Turkish State would, if carried to achievement, place
the Armenian plateau, including Russian Armenia, imder
Turkish sovereignty and jeopardize the whole future of their
race. The outbreak of the Great War brought these issues
to a head. The Turkish Government in furtherance of their
own aims tried to secure Armenian support against Russia,
particularly the support of Russian Armenians. A grim
alternative was presented to the Armenian leaders. Should
they throw their national weight as far as it lay in their
power on the side of Russia or of Turkey, or should they
let their people be divided and driven into battle ag ains t
each other? They took the remarkable decision that if
war should come, their people in Turkey and in Russia
should do their duty to their respective Governments. They
thought it better to face fratricidal strife in the quarrels
of others than to stake their existence upon the victory of
either side.

When Turkey attacked Russian Armenia, the Czar's
Government, fearing that a successful defence of Caucasia
by Armenians would dangerously inflame the Nationalist
aspirations of the race, conveyed a hundred and fifty thou-

GREEK TRAGEDY

405

sand Armenian conscripts to the Polish and Galician fronts Tie 1915
and brought other Russian troops to defend Armenian
hearths and homes in Caucasia. Few of these hundred
and.fifty thousand Armenian soldiers survived the European
battles or were able to return to Caucasia before the end of
the War. This was hard measure. But worse remained.

The Turkish war plan failed. Their offensive against
Caucasia in December 1914 and January 1915 was defeated.

They recoiled in deep resentment. They accused the
Armenians of the Turkish eastern districts of having acted
as spies and agents on behalf of Russia, and of having
assailed the Turkish lines of communication. These charges
were probably true ; but true or false, they provoked a
vengeance which was also in accord with deliberate policy.

In 1915 the Turkish Government began and ruthlessly
carried out the infamous general massacre and deportation
of Armenians in Asia Minor. Three or four hundred
thousand men, women and children escaped into Russian
territory and others into Persia or Mesopotamia ; but the
clearance of the race from Asia Minor was about as
complete as such an act, bn a scale so great, could weE
be. It is supposed that about one and a quarter millions
of Armenians were involved, of whom more than
half perished. There is no reasonable doubt that this
crime was planned and executed for political reasons. The
opportunity presented itself for clearing Turkish soil of a
Christian race opposed to aU Turkish ambitions, cherishing
national ambitions that could only be satisfied at the
expense of Turkey, and planted geographicaUy between
Turkish and Caucasian Moslems. It may weE be that the
British attack on the GaEipoE Peninsula stimrEated the
mercEess fury of the Turkish Government. Even, thought
the Pan-Turks, if Constantinople were to faE an'd Turkey
lost the war, the clearance would have been effected and
a permanent advantage for the future of the Turkish race
would be gained.

The arrival of the Grand Duke Nicholas in the Caucasus
at the beginning of 1916, his masterly capture of Erzeroum
in February 1916, and his conquests of Turkish territory
in North-Eastern Asia Minor revived Armenian hopes.

4o6 the world crisis : the aftermath

Tie Turkish The entry of the United States raised them higher. But

Conquest. Russian Revolution quenched this flicker. It is not

possible here to foUow the tangled conflicts of the Georgians,
Armenians and Tartars which followed. Early in 1918 the
Russian Army of the Caucasus abandoned the front in
Asia Minor and dissolved into an armed rabble struggling
to entrain for home. The Russians had gone. The Turks
had not yet come. A desperate effort was made by the
remaining Armenian manhood to defend their country.
The Armenian elements of the Russian Army therefore held
together, and with the help of volunteers succeeded for a
time in holding back the Turkish advance. Their hundred
and fifty thousand soldiers were already dead or scattered,
and they could never muster more than 35,000 men. The
Treaty of Brest-Litovsk in February 1918 was the signal for a
general Turkish advance eastward. The Armenian line was
overwhelmed ; and by May not only had the Turks recovered
the districts occupied by the Greind Duke, but they had
taken the districts of Batum, Kars and Ardahan and were
preparing to advance to the Caspian. Meanwhile the great
Allies strode forward. British, French and United States
troops beat down the German armies in France. The Anglo-
* Indian armies conquered Mesopotamia, Palestine and Syria.
At the very moment when the Turks had reached the goal in
Caucasia for which they had run such risks and to which
they had waded through crime and slaughter, their whole
State and structure fell prostrate. The Armenian people
emerged from the Great War scattered, extirpated in many
districts, and reduced through massacre, losses of war and
enforced deportations adopted as an easy system of killing,
by at least a third. Out of a commrmity of about two and
a half millions, three-quarters of a million men, women and
diildren had perished. But surely this was the end.

The earlier miseries and massacres of the Armenians have
been made familiar to the British people, and indeed to
the Liberal world, by the fame and eloquence of Mr. Glad-
stone. Opinions about them differed, one school dwelling
upon their sufferings and the other upon their failings.
But at any rate hr contrast to the general indifference
with which the fortunes of Eastern and Middle-Eastern

GREEK TRAGEDY

407

peoples were followed by the Western democracies, the
Armenians and their tribulations were well known through-
out England and the United States. This field of interest
was lighted by the lamps of religion, philanthropy and
politics. Atrocities perpetrated upon Armenians stirred
the ire of simple and chivalrous men and women spread
widely about the English-speaking world. Now was the
moment when at last the Armenians would receive justice
and the right to live in peace in their national home. Their
persecutors and t3rrants had been laid low by war or revolu-
tion. The greatest nations in the hour of their victory
were their friends, and would see them righted.

It seemed inconceivable that the five great Allies would
not be able to make their will effective. The reader of
these pages will however be under no illusions. By the
time the conquerors in Paris reached the Armenian question
their unity was dissolved, their armies had disappeared
and their resolves commanded naught but empty words.
No power would take a mandate for Armenia. Britain,
Italy, America, France looked at it and shook their heads.
On March 12, 1920, the Supreme Council offered the mandate
to the League of Nations. But the League, unsupported
by men or money, promptly and with prudence declined.
There remained the Treaty of Sevres. On August 10 the
Powers compelled the Constantinople Government to
recognize an as yet undetermined Armenia as a free and
independent State. Article 89 prescribed that Turkey
must submit to ‘ the arbitration of the President of the
United States of America the question of the frontier to
be fixed between Turkey and Armenia in the vilayets of
Erzeroum, Trebizond, Van and Bitlis, and to accept his
decision thereupon, as well as any stipulation he may
prescribe as to access of Armenia to the sea.’ It was not
until December 1920 that President Wilson completed the
discharge of this high function. The frontier he defined
gave Armenia virtually all the Turkish territory which had
been occupied by Russian troops until they disbanded them-
selves under the influence of the Revolution ; an area which,
added to the Republic of Erivan, made an Armenian national
homeland of nearly sixty thousand square nules.

The Friends
of Armenia.

Obliteration
Once More.

408 THE WORLD CRISIS ; the aftermath

So generous was the recognition in theory of Armenian
claims that the Armenian and Greek population of the new
State was actually outnumbered by Moslem inhabitants.
Here was justice and much more. It existed however upon
paper only. Already nearly a year before, in January
1920, the Turks had attacked the French in Cilicia, driven
them out of the Marash district and massacred nearly
fifty thousand Armenian inhabitants. In May Bolshevik
troops invaded and subjugated the Republic of Erivan.
In September, by collusion between the Bolsheviks and
Turks, Erivan was delivered to the Turkish Nationalists ;
and as in Cilicia, another extensive massacre of Armenians
accompanied the military operations. Even the hope that
a small autonomous Armenian province might eventually
be established in Cihcia under French protection was
destroyed. In October France, by the Agreement of Angora,
undertook to evacuate Cihcia completely. In the Treaty
of Lausanne, which registered the final peace between Turkey
and the Great Powers, history will search in vain for the
word ‘Armenia.’

CHAPTER XIX
CHANAK

The Greek Soldier — ^The Silent Strain — ^British Indifference : French

Antagonism— America Absent— The Appeals of Gounaris

An exhausted Lloyd George — ^The Agreement with Russia

Turkish Atrocities — The Greek Design upon Constantinople

The Decisive Battle : Afium Karahissar — Destruction of the
Greek Army — A Grave Situation — The Reckoning — The Neu-
tral Zone — ^Alarm and Despondency — ^The British Fleet

The Telegram to the Dominions — ^The Official Communiqu6 :
September i6 — ^The Issue Explained— The Telegram overtaken
— Response of the Dominions — French and Italian Retirement
— ^Military Measures — The Chanak Position — Strategic Re-
assurance — ^My Memorandum of September 30 — Kemal's
Alternative — ^Mudania — ^The Crisis ended — ^The Treaty ’ of
Lausanne.

T he final act of the Greek Tragedy now begins. It
lasted for nearly a year. The Greeks had failed to
reach Angora or to crush Kemalist Turkey. Unsuccessful
at the Sakaria River in September 1921, their armies fell
back on intermediate entrenched positions covering the
Smjma-Aidin Province. Here they remained disconso-
lately, but stubbornly, month after month. Justice must
be done to the Greek soldier, so often the butt of ignorance
and prejudice. Imagine an army of two hundred thousand
men, the product of a small state mobilized or at war for
ten years, stranded in the centre of Asia Minor with a
divided nation behind them; with party dissensions in
every rank ; far from home, and bereft of effectual political
guidance ; conscious that they were abandoned by the
Great Powers of Europe and by the United States ; with
' scanty food and decaying equipment ; without tea, with-
out sugar, without cigarettes, and without hope or even a
plan of despair ; while before them and around them and
behind them preyed and prowled a sturdy, relentless and
ever more confident foe. The tests of battle are bard, but

409

The Greek
Soldier.

The Silent
Strain.

410 THE WORLD CRISIS : the aftermath

the armies of all nations have withstood them. But here
was the long gnawing strain of suffering much and talking
more, of having little and doing nothing.

‘ All’s quiet along the Potomac to-night.

Except now and then a stray picket
Is shot, as he walks on his beat to and fro.

By a rifleman hid in the thicket.

TTie army of the Potomac had a mighty nation behind
it ; had a clear world cause to light its bayonets ; was
fed and clothed and reinforced. The soldiers knew what
they had come for and they were certain they would get
what they sought. But over the Greek Army in Asia
Minor there stole an ever-growing sense of isolation ; of
lines of communication in jeopardy, of a crumbling base,
of a'divided homeland, and of an indifferent world. Never-
theless they remained in martial posture for upwards of nine
months.

It is one of the proofs of Mustapha Kemal’s military
qualities that he also was able and indeed content to wait
and capable of compelling others to wait with him. He
saw that time and petty harassing would ripen the fruits
he now felt sure of gathering. Nine months is a long time
in this quick-moving age ; but during nine months the
Turks waited and the Greeks endured.

Meanwhile many efforts were made by the British Govern-
ment to bring about a Turkish settlement and a Greek
withdrawal. But they were aU made half-heartedly, and
with a lack of collective vigour and conviction unworthy
of a government whose leading men had been schooled in
the greatest of wars. This feebleness can only be explained
by the general mental exhaustion of war-worn Ministers,
by divergencies of sentiment, and by growing domestic pre-
occupations. Of these last something will be said later.
This was a period when the East seemed in a trance ;
nothing seemed to be happening there ; and with an ever-
roughening political breeze at home, it was soothing to the
pubhc to see at any rate one spot where the situation
was at least stagnant. But all the time a bankrupt Greece
was spending a quarter of a million pounds a week in Asia
Minor alone, the Venizelists and monarchists of Greece

CHANAK

411

were eyeing each other in deadly rivalry; and an army
as large as Britain sent to the South African War was
wilting and wasting across the sea.

There are cases in which strong measures are the only
form of prudence and mercy. Use firmly the power of
Britain — ^it is still considerable ; compel Greece to concede
and Turkey to forbear ; knock their heads together until
they settle. Such was my counsel. ‘ But,’ they said, ' who
is going to do the knocking ? We have no troops to spare.
We cannot embroil ourselves in foreign wars.’ But surely
this might have been thought of earlier? And so the
months sped by — drip, drip, drip ; rot, rot, rot.

Meanwhile, Party Politics began to crackle cheerfully on
the hearth ; and Liberals said, ‘ Our turn will soon come ’ ;
and Labour said, ‘ What about the unemployed ? ’ and
Conservatives said, ‘ Isn’t it time we had a government
of our own ? ’ and everybody said, ‘ It seems to be settling
down out there, and anyhow it is none of our business.
Haven’t we had enough ? ’

But the French took a different line. Once Venizelos
had quitted Athens they wiped Greece off their ledger.
A few months passed and their envoys were at Angora.
The new Turkey had much to offer France. She could
give France peace in Cilicia. She could mitigate the dis-
contents of Syria. Then there were important commercial
openings in Anatolia, A Turkish Government which had
marched from Angora to Constantinople with the good-
will of France would have much to give. M. Fra nkl i n-
Botullon, voluble, plausible, ardent, ambitious, was already
at Angora. On October 20, 1921 he signed a mutually
profitable agreement between France and Nationalist
Turkey. Mustapha Kemal needed munitions — France
had plenty of munitions ; he lacked cannon — ^who makes
better guns than Creusot ? As for aeroplanes, a few at
any rate are necessary to any modem army. It would be
a pity that he should not have them. Divergencies of policy
and personal incompatibilities had produced at this time
an astonishing separation between France and Britain.
These days are over ; new and more comprehensive unities
have been established ; but events must be recorded.

British

Indifference

French

Antagonism

America

Absent.

412 THE WORLD CRISIS : the aftermath

Where was America ? She was at the other side of the
Atlantic Ocean. All the domestic stresses which stirred
British politics and politicians reproduced themselves with
far greater vehemence in the United States. The Presi-
dential Election of 1920 had swept Wilson and the Demo-
cratic Party for the time completely off the stage. Their
ill-used and infuriated opponents were in the saddle. Their
policy was to find out exactly what President Wilson had
wished or had promised and to do the opposite. So the
Government of the United States, which had at one time
seemed to play with the idea of becoming a mandatory
for Constantinople and for Armenia, which had definitely
undertaken to define the boundaries of Armenia, shrugged
its shoulders and moralized upon the quarrels and muddles
of the benighted Old World, and fervently thanked
Providence that except for some useful souvenirs they
were out of it, and back home.

These are not perhaps complimentary accounts of the
attitude of the three Great Powers at whose request the
Greeks had originally invaded Smyrna. But it would be
wrong to impute weakness or turpitude or callousness to
any of them. Modem forces are so ponderous and individual
leaders relatively so small, so precariously balanced, so
frequently changed ; the collective life moves forward so
irresistibly, that too much vitality or perseverance or coherent
policy should not be counted on from large communities.
There are moments when each is grand and noble ; there
are moments when all are expressionless slabs. King
Constantine and his Prime Minister Gounaris ought to have
thought of this before they broke the links of obligation.

Our brief chronicle of military events ceased with the
failure of the Greek Army in September 1921 to reach
Angora and with their retreat from the Sakaria River to
winter positions east of the line Eskishehr and Afium-
Karahissar. Here they remained for nearly a year.
Meanwhile the ill-fated Gounaris flitted to and fro between
Athens and London begging for money and arms to carry
on the war and still more for help to get out of it. He was
confronted by Lord Curzon, who soused him in sonorous
correctitudes. At these interviews the main effort of Gou-

CHANAK

413

naris was to throw the agonized fortunes of Greece into The Appeals
the sole hands of Great Britain ; the main object of Lord Gounans.
Curzon was to avoid incurring in any form or sense this
ugly responsibility, but at the same time to persuade Greece
to accept Allied mediation. On the- whole Lord Curzon was
successful. Gounaris was made to feel that England would
do nothing, and that his only chance lay in inter-AUied good
offices. But even this chance was, it seemed, a poor one,
because France was now ardently backing and re-arming
the Turks, and England had no intention of becoming
embroiled for the sake of pro-Constantine Greece. On
the one hand, the cries of a drowning man ; on the other,
good advice from one who had no intention of going into
the water !

This attitude was justifiable in Lord Curzon, who had
throughout, under the guidance of the Foreign Office,
played an uncompromised, circumspect and inefiectual part,
and who certainly felt no obligation and equally no desire
to run any risks either personal or national for the Greeks.

It was Lord Curzon’s failing, as his biographer has revealed,
that he loved to state a case, and lost interest in it once it had
flowed from his lips or his pen. He realized and deplored
the plight of Greece ; he hated the Turks, and feared their
growing strength. He was scandalized by the suddenness
with which the French had not only washed their hands of
all Greek obligations, but had actually thrown their weight
upon the Turkish side ; but he was not often capable of
producing real action in any sense. In deeds he rarely dinted
the surface of events ; but his diplomatic conversations were
extremely well conducted, and there was no lack of lucid
and eloquent State papers. He did not, for instance, say
to Gounaris, ‘ Evacuate Asia Minor at once or the British
Fleet will blockade the Piraeus.’ Or to the French, ' Act
with more comradeship in this matter or we will disinterest
ourselves in Europe and withdraw our troops from the
Rhine.’ He could not be reproached for not talcing
either or both of these courses or doing anything else,
because he had never at any time done anything in this
theatre either good or bad which deflected the march of
events.

An ex-
hausted
Lloyd
George.

414 THE WORLD CRISIS : the aftermath

But with the Prime Minister it was different. Yearning
as he did for Greek success and still more for Greek extrica-
tion ; being himself an exemplar of audacious and resourceful
action, it was surprising that he did riot, having gone so far,
on this issue take his own fate in his hands. After all, here
again was the occasion he had so often sincerely sought to quit
the dimming scene. The forces that sustained the Coalition
were swiftly decomposing ; he had been flouted and defied by
of&cials of the Conservative organization ; his own followers
were cut from their party roots and lived politically Hke
flowers in a vase. In the fierce duress of the war and its
consequences he had run through all the parties and many
of the friendships. But he was still — and none could
strip him of his fame — the ‘ pilot who weathered the
storm ’ ; he was still the great Lloyd George, the best-known
human being in the cottages of Britain ; he was still armed
with the decisive power of a Prime Minister to terminate
the life of his Government by resignation. Surely he might
have said, ‘ Either there is a living poUcy about Greece and
Turkey, or I go.’ But he was exhausted by all he had
gone through, and worse still, he was loaded with day-to-day
affairs and the routine of high command. Actually he was
negotiating with the Bolsheviks at Genoa and being deceived
by them. So nothing happened, and Gounaris, who had
pulled down Venizelos, went back from his last London
visit to reap where he had sown.

Mr, Churchill to Lord Curzon

April 26, 1922.

Like you I am deeply concerned about this Genoa
business.^ I have long foreseen the danger of Germany
and Russia making common cause and have frequently
referred to it in public speeches. The policy which I had
thought best calculated to prevent or at least modify and
delay such an evil orientation was to secure the confidence
of France, and armed with that to bring about a tripartite
understanding between England, France and Germany for
mutual help and security, thus making it plain to Germany
that she had good hopes of a bright future with England
and France and that she would lose these prospects by

^ The Russo-German Agreement had just been disclosed to the
Genoa Conference.

CHANAK

415

exclusive dealing with the Soviets. . . . The foundation of
this policy was always the guarantee to France [of aid
against aggression], on the basis of which I believed, and
stiU believe, it is possible to secure so great a measure of
French confidence as to enable better relations to be estab-
lished with Germany both by Britain and by France. . . .
However Utopian these aspirations may be, they appear to
be capable of simple explanation and to be the lines along
which we could have safely worked, not only for a month
but for a year, and not only for a year but for several
years.

However, an entirely difierent course has been taken by
the Prime Minister, in which the Foreign OfSce has, it seems
to me, had very little chance of bringing its special aptitudes
into play. The great objective of the Prime Minister’s
policy has been Moscow, to make Great Britain the nation
in the closest possible relations with the Bolsheviks, and to
be their protectors and sponsors before Europe. I have
been unable to discern any British interest, however slight,
in this. ... Of trade advantages there are none that will
bear fruit for many years. However, we have been led,
drawm or dragged steadily along this road. We have
separated ourselves in our attitude towards Russia from
both the great democracies with which we are most intim-
ately connected, viz., the United States and France. In
our anxiety to placate the Bolsheviks we have lost so much
confidence and goodwill that very little influence is left to
us now to restrain France from any harsh action against
Germany. We ought, on the contrary, to have kept all
our strength for this most important development. I am
sure that if we had been good friends with them and had
kept their goodwill, we should have been in a position very
greatly to influence and modify their action. As it is, on
what is largely a Russian issue we are being drawn into
something perilously near a complete break with France.
I am not prepared to contemplate this. I fear that the
results would be bad in every sense, that France and the
Little Entente will defend their position by strong and
drastic action, that Germany and Russia will close their
ranks, and that we shall be left a sort of universal marplot
without a friend and without a policy.

Another set of misunderstandings has arisen with France
about Turkey, and I can well understand the many reasons
you have for complaint against them there. At the same
time the policy which has been imposed upon us in regard
to Turkey has been a policy contrary not only to the interests
of France but to those of Great Britain, Our continued

The Agree-
ment with
Russia.

4i6 the world CRISIS: the aftermath

Turkish bolstering up of the Greeks and hostility towards the Turks

Atrocities, has been inconaprehensible to the French, who have been
unable in their minds to discern any British interest behind
it, and consequently have continually suspected all sorts of
extraordinary motives. This has added a long string of
difficulties to the relations between the two coimtries. I
greatly admired your efforts in Paris to retrieve a situation
already fatally compromised.

To return to our tale ; there followed a series of
superficial diplomatic movements. Briand had fallen after
the Cannes Conference and golf match of January 1922,
and Poincar^, in this phase a bristling partisan scarcely
recognizable in the great figure which has since emerged,
ruled in his stead. Marching in triumphantly from
Opposition, he only thought of Reparations, of the Rhine
and of the Ruhr, If the Turks could help France at the
moment, so much the better for them. If King Constantine
suffered, it served him right. If the Greeks suffered for
having chosen King Constantine, that was their affair.
‘Vous I’avez voulu, George Dandin.’ The reader must
understand that all this was expressed in the most seemly
language, which would have brought no blush to the cheeks
of the League of Nations, and our paraphrase is only
intended to convey its consequential meaning.

Very sluggishly England, France and Italy, embarked
on simultaneous negotiations with the Turks and Greeks.
Technically war continued, but actually from the end of
March to the end of May (1922) there was a suspension of
arms in Asia Minor. The Allied Conference which eventually
met in Paris on March 22-26 proposed an Armistice together
with peace terms which would have entailed the Greek
•evacuation of Asia Minor. Greece accepted the Armistice
and made no reply regarding the terms. Angora refused
even the Armistice unless it was preceded by the Greek
evacuation. For a space the deadlock continued. But in
May the belated news of bloody events in Anatolia began to
trickle into the subsidiary columns of the newspapers.
Reports of massacres of the Christian population appeared
daily. The details of the atrocities committed by the
Turks in the Caucasus during the winter of 1920 when the
fifty thousand Armenians had perished, and the appalling

CHANAK

417

deportations of Greeks from the Trebizond and Samsun The Greek
districts which had occurred in the autumn of 1921, were
now for the first time reaching Europe. During Jime 1922 “opie.
the methodical extermination of Greeks in Western Anatolia
was in full swing. In spite of French efforts to minimize
these horrors and to prove similax atrocities on a minor
scale against the Greeks, public opinion so far as it existed
turned sternly against the Turks.

In July Constantine and his Prime Minister Gounaris in
their desperation played a shrewd stroke. Swiftly recalling
two divisions from Asia Minor to join their army in Thrace,
they demanded permission from the Allies to enter Con-
stantinople. There was no reason to doubt their power to
occupy the dty, and the mere threat when it became known
startled the Angora Turks. It is quite possible that under
cover of a temporary Greek occupation of Constantinople
with Allied approval, the escape of the Greek armies from
Asia Minor might have been honourably and comparatively
painlessly merged in negotiations for peace. Certainly
after the Greek army had failed on the Sakaria, nothing
but the occupation of Constantinople could have restored the
fortunes of the Royal Family and the Royalists in Greece.

At least it could be argued against the Allies that i'
they would not help the Greeks in their military operations x
they ought not to hamper them ; and if on general groimds
they felt compelled to hamper, they ought at least loyally
and actively to help them to their ships. However, here
again all ended in futility. The Greeks were forbidden by
the deployment of the armed forces of England, France and
Italy to enter Constantinople, and the only lasting result
of an exceedingly well-conceived means of covering their
retirement from Anatolia was a weakening of their army
on the threatened front. This was the final move before
the catastrophe.

The moment for which Mustapha Kemal had waited so
stolidly had now arrived. He knew that the Greeks had
withdrawn the two divisions from his front to Thrace. He
knew that this transference had equalized the Greek and
Turkish forces. He understood that the Greek troops
before him were aware that anyhow they would have to

DD

The Decisive
Battle :
Afiuin
Karahissar.

418 THE WORLD CRISIS : the aftermath

leave Asia Minor. He was now fairly well equipped, thanks
to the assistance of at least one Great Power, with arms and
war material, and he also enjoyed on a small scale superi-
ority in the air. His operations were complicated and
masterly. By threatening the Ismid Peninsula and Brusa,
he drew Greek forces to the north ; by a cavalry sweep
to the east of Aidin in the valley of the Meander, he
lured half another Greek division to the south. He con-
centrated for his main battle on the Afimn-Karahissar
position about eighty thousand rifles and sabres and one
hundred and eighty guns. The Greeks mustered about
seventy-five thousand men with three htmdred and fifty
guns. On the morning of August 26 the Turks attacked
with three corps on a fifteen-mile front south-west of Afium-
Karahissar. By the afternoon of the next day the Greek
line had been decisively pierced by the First Turkish Corps
and a Greek general retreat began. This soon became a
rout. The mam Greek army fied towards Sm3nma. By
August 31 their flight was so rapid that the pursuing Turks
had lost all touch with them. General Tricoupis, the latest
Commander-in-Chief, and his Staff were captured on
September 2. They had endeavoured to lead a counter-
attack, but not being followed by their men fell into the
hands of a Turkish cavalry squadron. Although the
Turkish main body marched one hundred mUes in three
days, they never caught up the Greeks until they reached
Sm3nma on September 9. Large numbers of refugees and
forty thousand Greeks had already embarked when the
Turks entered the city. But fifty thousand prisoners were
taken by the Turks.

The Third Greek Corps retreated to their base on the
Sea of Marmora. As they approached Mudania, hotly
pursued, a French officer informed them that they were in
the neutral zone and must surrender. The Commanders of
the two leading regiments, knowing that Mudania was not
in the neutral zone, refused to surrender and led their
regiments successfully by hill paths to Panderma. Part of
the main body, however, surrendered to the French and
were handed over to the Kemalists ; the remainder found
Upping at Panderma after abandoning their guns. Thus

CHANAK

4x9

within a fortnight from August 26 the Greek army which Destruction

had entered Anatolia at the request of Great Britain,

the United States and France, which had been for three

years the foundation of Allied policy against Turkey and

the object of inter-Allied intrigues, was destroyed or driven

into the sea. Turkey became once again the sole master of

Asia Minor, and Mustapha Kemal’s Army, having celebrated

their triumph by the burning of Sm3?ma to ashes and by a

vast massacre of its Christian population, turned the heads

of their columns hopefully towards Constantinople and the

Straits.

The catastrophe which Greek recklessness and Allied
procrastination, division and intrigue had long prepared
now broke upon Europe. The signatories of the Treaty of
Sfevres had only been preserved in their world of illusion
by the shield of Greece. That shield was now shattered.

Nothing but a dozen battalions of disunited British, French
and Italian troops stood between the returning war and
Europe ; the flames of Smyrna and its hideous massacres
were a foretaste of what the fate of Constantinople might
be. The consequences of a new Turkish invasion of Europe
were incalculable. A struggle of Kemal’s armies, reinforced
by the resources and man-power of Constantinople, with the
Greeks in Thrace must raise every Balkan danger. The re-
entry of the Turks into Europe, as conquerors tmtrammeUed
and untamed, reeking wdth the blood of helpless Christian
populations must, after all that had happened in the war,
signalize the worst humiliation of the Allies. Nowhere
had their victory been more complete than over Turkey ;
nowhere had the conqueror’s power been flaunted more
arrogantly than in Turkey ; and now, in the end, all the
fruits of successful war, all the laurds for which so many
scores of thousands had died on the Gallipoli Peninsula, in
the deserts of Palestine and Mesopotamia, in the marshes
of the Salonika front, in the ships which fed these vast
expeditions ; all the diversions of allied resources in
men, in arms, in treasure which they had required ; all
was to end in diame. Victory over Turkey absolute and
unchallenged had been laid by the armies upon the council
table of the Peace Conference. Four years had passed,

A Grave
Situation.

420 THE WORLD CRISIS : the aftermath

and the talkers had turned it into defeat. Four years had
passed, darkened by a purposeless carnage, not only on
fields of battle, but even more of women and children, the
old, the weak, the xmarmed. AH the fine pretensions of
Europe and the United States, all the eloquence of their
statesmen, all the hiving and burrowing committees and
commissions, had led the erstwhile masters of overwhelming
power to this bitter and ignominious finish.

But surely the last word had not yet been spoken ; surely
there was still time, not indeed to retrieve the disaster, but
at least to bring about a peace which would leave the Allies
some vestiges of respect and would protect Europe from a
new conflagration. And here obligation took a precise
form. The area aroimd Constantinople from the lines of
Chatalja to those of Ismid, from the Black Sea to the
Straits of the Dardanelles, had been declared a neutral
zone. The KemaJists had agreed to respect it ; it had
been delimited with their officers ; it was plainly marked.
We have seen how only a few months before when Greece
sought to repair her desperate fortimes by entering Con-
stantinople, these same allies had proclaimed the sanctity
of the neutral zone and British, French and Italian troops
had actually marched out' in war array and displayed their
standards in its defence. If it was right to deprive the
Greeks by united allied action of what was perhaps their
sole means of saving their armies in Asia Minor, was it not
equally a duty to prevent the Turks from passing through
this same neutral zone to attack and destroy the remnants
of the Greek armies in Thrace ? If England, despite the
Greek sympathies of her Prime Minister, had marched with
France and Italy to arrest the Greek advance upon Con-
stantinople, was it not an equal obligation upon these
Powers to stand with us in defence of the limit which the
three Powers had jointly prescribed and engaged themselves
to maintain ?

Were we really going to be chased out of Constantinople
to our ships, leaving the Sultan, his Ministers, and every
person who had followed our instructions in canying out the
conditions of the Armistice, to be punished as traitors to
■Ihdr country ? Were three Great Nations, with the screams

CHANAK

421

of Sin3niia in their ears, really to scuttle at the approach of
armed men ? Would they abandon the city on which they
had laid their hands, for which they had assumed so direct
a responsibility, to a ruthless vengeance, and still worse to
a blind anarchy ? But if this was not to be, something
more was needed than bluff and blather ; unless ever3rthing
was to clatter down, someone must stand firm. Not much
was to be expected from the Italians. They knew the
Greeks had been sent to Asia Minor to forestall what
they considered their rightful claims. Now the Greeks
had been driven into the sea, and with the Greek dreams
there fell also or at least subsided Italian ambitions. But
France, the warrior nation, captain of the Allies in Armaged-
don, the France of Foch and Clemenceau — ^was France to
be fotmd unwilling to discharge her trust ? Many allow-
ances may be made for the peccadilloes of which Franklin-
Bouillon was the agent. The breach of sentiment and
understanding between Lloyd George and Poincar 6 was
complete. Every form of mutual repulsion operated between
them. The Lloyd-Georgian policy of building up a great
Greek empire had little concern with the interests of France,
and a standing quarrel with the Turks exposed France to
peculiar diSiculties in the S5uian territories she had so
recently acquired by force. Indeed, this policy was deemed
by do min ant British opinion contrary to a long view of the
interests of the British Empire. It was a personal policy,
pmrsued moreover by its author oiily with limited liability.
The French could not understand what the Britidi were
after. Other divergences had arisen about Reparations
and the Peace Treaty ; and the shadow of a French invasion
of the Ruhr himg darkly over the feeble revival of -Europe.
Anglo-French relations were at their worst ; it was hard to
believe that two peoples who had gone through so much
and achieved so much together and buried so many dead
in common and saved their souls alive from the fieiy furnace
in good comradeship, should so swiftly have fallen apart.
But after all, these had been only superficial difl&culties,
like bad manners between good Mends. Suddenly the
situation had become formidable. Frmdamental issues rose
like granite rocks above the froth and slime.

The

Reckoning,

The Neutral
Zone.

42a THE WORLD CRISIS : the aftermath

We had a right to expect that France would stand to
her engagements to maintain the neutral zone ; and it is
always pleasing to remember that this was the spontaneous
instinct of the French High Command in Constantinople.
On September ii Mustapha Kemal was notified by the
High Commissioners of the Three Powers that he must
not transgress the neutral zone. The slender British forces
making a front on the Ismid Peninsula and at Chanak on
the Asiatic shore of the Dardanelles were reinforced by
detachments from the French and Italian armies. In order
to avoid the firing of a shot, the three Great Powers had
only to act together and thus convince Mustapha Kemal
that while he could have a satisfactory peace if he halted
beyond the boundary line, he would encounter unlimited
resources by its violation. But if we were all three to
shuffle ofi in a ‘ devil take the hindmost ’ mood, then blood
would flow and fire would bum, and none could tell how
peace might be restored. In any quarrel among men, if
one side proclaims its complete impotence of will and
hand, there are no bounds to the evils that may ensue.

I come down to the personal thread on which this narrative
of large events is strung. The reader is perhaps convinced
that I tried my best to prevent this hateful and fearful situa-
tion from coming into being. But here it was. The resus-
citated Turk was marching upon the Dardanelles and Con-
stantinople, and beyond them, upon Europe. I thought he
ought to be stopped. If, indeed, unhappily he re-entered
Europe it should be by Treaty, and not by violence. Defeat is
a nauseating draught ; and that the victors in the greatest of
all wars should gulp it down, was not readily to be accepted.
When one knew that a single gesture would immediately
restore to them full control of the event, it was surely worth
making an effort. So having done my utmost for three
years to procure a friendly peace with Mustapha Kemal
and the withdrawal of the Greeks from Asia Minor, and
having consistently opposed my friend the Prime Minister
upon this issue, I now foxmd myself whole-heartedly upon
his side in resisting the consequences of the policy whidh
I had condenoned. I found myself in this business with
a small group of resolute men : the Prime Minis ter, Lord

CHANAK

423

Balfotir, Mr. Austen Chamberlain, Lord Birkenhead, Sir Alarm and
Laming Worthington-Evans, with the technical assist- dMcyf'
ance, willingly proffered, of the three Chiefs of Staff,

Beatty, Cavan and Trenchaxd. We made common cause.

The Government might break up and we might be relieved
of our burden. The nation might not support us : they
could find others to advise them. The Press might howl,
the Allies might bolt. We intended to force the Turk to
a negotiated peace before he should set foot in Europe.

The aim was modest, but the forces were small ; and events
had been so much mismanaged during these last three years
that public opinion at home and throughout the Empire was
ill-prepared to support, and indeed prejudiced against, the
necessary minor but rough measures which had to be taken.

How to stop the Turk, and how, after stopping him,
bring the Turk to parley ? That was the problem. The
days were passing ; the long columns of ragged, valiant
Ottoman soldiery who, their cruelties apart, deserved the
salutes due to those who do not despair of their country,
were streaming northward towards Constantinople and the
Dardanelles. Would they halt at the neutral zone ?

It seemed to many people who woke up suddenly to
find an exciting crisis that we had no means of resistance.

The forces of the opponent were wildly exaggerated.

Mustapha Kemal, we were told, had one himdred and
fifty thousand well-armed men, organized in as many
divisions as would have held a milli on in the Great War ;
behind these were another one hundred and fifty thousand ;
and again, stiU further in the rear, all the Moslems in the
world. Both the French and Italians had sold them arms
and had sought their favours; so it was unlikely that
these Powers would give much. help. StiH one hoped that
they would at any rate preserve the decencies. But if it
were left to England alone to stop the Turk re-entering
Europe, was it a task ‘ within the compass of h^ stride ’ ?

Here it is worth while considering the peculiar strategic
position which we enjoyed in virtue of our hold upon the
Gallipoli Peninsula and of our undisputed command of the
sea. The British Me(hterranean Fleet lay in the Marmora,
and its flotillas swept to and fro through the DardaneEes

The British
Fleet.

424 THE WORLD CRISIS : the aftermath

and the Bosphoras. No army could pass from Asia into
Europe except piecemeal and clandestinely, at night. But,
it was said, the Turks will bring cannon to the Asiatic
shores of both these Straits and fire on the flotillas and
supply-vessels. To which we said, what cannon ? It was
found that they had no cannon that could destroy even
small warships, and ours were large ones. StiU, they would
fire at them. But Beatty said the Navy would put up with
that ; also that they would fire back. As long as the
British Fleet held this line of deep salt water between
Europe and Asia the war could not be carried into Thrace.

On September 15, the British Cabinet met in prolonged
session. Sir Charles Harington commanded for the AUies
at Constantinople. Lord Plumer, his old chief of Second
Army days, had arrived there on a visit. He had telegraphed
saying that he Wcis sure General Harington’s arrangements had
been correct and sound. The situation was in his opinion
serious and required firm and decided action without delay.
It was quite clear to him that the Kemalists meant to try to
impose their conditions on the Allies, preferably by threaten-
ing force, but actually by force if no result was produced by
threats. If things were allowed to drift further, it was abso-
lutely certain that we should be driven into a corner mUitarily
and politically. Such was his view. On this and all other
information the Cabinet came, without dissension if not
unitedly, to serious resolves. I was instructed by minute to
draft a telegram for the Prime Minister to send to the
Dominions informing them of the critical situation and invit-
ing their aid. I accordingly prepared a message stating that
a decision had been taken by the Cabinet to resist aggression
upon Europe by the Turks and to make exertions to prevent
Mustapha Kemal driving the AUies out of Constantinople,
and in particular and above aU to secure firmly the Gallipoli
Peninsula in order to maintain the freedom of the Straits.
We had received a notification from the French Government
that they were in agreement with us in informing Mustapha
Kemal that he must not violate the neutral zone which
protected Constantinople and the Straits. The Italians
also were acting in concert with us. We hoped to secure
the military participation of Greece, Roumania, and Serbia

CHANAK

425

in defence of the deep-water line between Europe and Asia,
and were addressing them accordingly. All the Powers
were being notified of our intention to make exertions,
and a British division was under orders to reinforce
the Allied Commander-in-Chief, Sir Charles Harington.
The Navy woxild co-operate to the fullest extent necessary.

The object of these arrangements, the message continued,
was to cover the period which must elapse before it was
possible to secure a stable peace with Turkey. Proposals
were being made to hold a Conference for this purpose
probably in Venice, or possibly in Paris. Meanwhile it
was essential that we should have sufficient strength to
maintain our position around the Straits and in Constanti-
nople until this peace had been achieved. It seemed
improbable that if a firm front was shown by a large number
of Powers acting together, the forces of Mustapha Kemal
would attack. The Prime Minister’s message ran : — These
armies, which have so far not had any serious resistance
to encounter from disheartened Greeks, are estimated at
between sixty and seventy thousand men, but timely
precautions are imperative. Grave consequences in India
and among other Mohammedan populations for which we
are responsible might result from a defeat or from a humiliat-
ing exodus of the Allies from Constantinople. ... I should
be glad to know whether the Governments of the [various
Dominions] are willing to associate themselves with our
action and whether they desire to be represented by a con-
tingent. . . . The annoxmcement of an ofEer from all or
any of the Dominions to send a contingent even of moderate
size would undoubtedly exercise in itself a most favourable
influence on the situation.’

I also drafted the next morning (Saturday) at the request
of the Prime Minister and his principal colleagues (except
Lord Curzon, who was at his country seat), a commmiiqu6
for publication. We felt that the public ought not to be
left longer in ignorance of the situation and its gravity.
This statement has been censured for being alarmist and
provocative in tone, and certainly it was ill-received in
important quarters. I am content to reproduce it so that
it can be judged here in retrospect.

The Tele-
gram to tlie
Dominions.

426 THE WORLD CRISIS : the aftermath

The Official ‘ . The approach of the Kemalist forces to Constanti-
Com: nople and the Dardanelles and the demands put forward

&ptember t)y the Angora Government ... if assented to, involve

i6. nothing less than the loss of the whole results of the victory

over Turkey in the late war. The chaimel of deep salt
water that separates Europe from Asia and unites the
Mediterranean and the Black Sea affects world interests,
European interests, and British interests of the first order.

‘ The British Government regard the effective and per-
manent freedom of the Straits as a vital necessity for the
sake of which they are prepared to make exertions. They
have learnt with great satisfaction that in this respect
their views are shared by France and Italy, the other two
Great Powers principally concerned.

‘ The question of Constantinople stands somewhat differ-
ently. For more than two years it has been decided that
the Turks should not be deprived of Constantinople, and
in January of last year at the Conference in London the
representatives of the Constantinople and Angora Turkish
Govermnents were informed of the intention of the Allies
to restore Constantinople to the Turks, subject to other
matters being satisfactorily adjusted.

‘The wish of the British Cabinet is that a Conference
should be held as speedily as possible in any place generally
acceptable to the other Powers involved, at which a resolute
and sustained effort should be made to secure a stable
peace with Turkey. But such a Conference caimot embark
upon its labours, stiff less carry them through with the
slightest prospect of success, while there is any question
of the Kemalist forces attacking the neutral zones by which
Constantinople, the Bosphorus, and the Dardanelles are
now protected.

‘The British and French Governments have instructed
their High Commissioners at Constantinople to notify
Mustapha Kemal and the Angora Government that these
neutral zones established tmder the flags of the three Great
Powers must be respected.

‘ However, it would be futile and dangerous, in view of
the excited mood and extravagant dauns of the Kemalists,
to trust simply to diplomatic action. Adequate force must
be available to guard the freedom of the Straits and defend
the deep-water line between Europe and Asia against a
violent and hostile Turkish aggression. That the Affies
diould be driven out of Constantinople by the forces of
Mustapha Kemal would be an event of the most disastrous
diaracter, producing, no doubt, far-reaching reactions
throughout all Moslem countries, and not only through all

CHANAK

427

Moslem coimtries but through all the States defeated in
the late war, who would be profoundly encoturaged by the
spectacle of the undreamed-of successes that have attended
the efforts of the comparatively weak Turkish forces.

' Moreover, the reappearance of the victorious Turk on
the European shore would provoke a situation of the gravest
character throughout the Balkans, and very likely lead
to bloodshed on a large scale in regions already cruelly
devastated. It is the duty of the Allies of the late war
to prevent this great danger, and to secure the orderly and
peaceful conditions in and arotind the Straits whici will
allow a conference to conduct its deliberations with dignity
and efficiency and so alone reach a permanent settlement.

‘ His Majesty’s Government are prepared to bear their
part in this matter and to make every possible effort for
a satisfactory solution. They have addressed themselves
in this sense to the other Great Powers with whom they
have been acting, and who jointly with them are associated
in the defence of Constantinople and the neutral zones.

' It is dear, however, that the other Ally Powers of the
Balkan Peninsula are also deeply and vitally affected.
Roumania was brought to her ruin in the Great War by
the strangulation of the Straits. The union of Turkey
and Bulgaria would be productive of deadly consequences
to Serbia in particular and to Yugo-Slavia as a whole. The
whole tradeof the Danube flowinginto the Black Seals likewise
sub j ect to strangulation if the Straits are dosed. The engage-
ment of Greek interests in these issues is also self-evident.

‘ His' Majesty’s Government are therefore addressing
themselves to aU these three Balkan Powers with a view
to their taking a part in the effective defence of the neutral
zones. His Majestys Government have also communicated
with the Dominions, pladng them in possession of the
facts and inviting them to be represented by contingents
in the defence of interests for which they have aheady
made enormous sacrifices and of soil which is hallowed
by immortal memories of the Anzacs.

' It is the intention of His Majesty’s Government to
reinforce immediatdy, and if necessary to a considerable
extent, the troops at the disposal of Sir Charles Harington,
the Allied Commander-in-Chief at Constantinople, and
orders have also been given to the British Fleet in the
Mediterranean to oppose by every means any infraction of
the neutral zones by the Turks or any attempt by them
to cross the European diore.'

The Prime Minister approved his tdegram to the

The Issue
Explained.

428 THE WORLD CRISIS : the aftermath

The Tele- Dominions before 7 p.m. on September 15 and it was

^rtaken. ciphered and despatched by 11.30 p.m. It had then to
be transmitted, deciphered, and delivered m the various
Governments. This process was not completed until the
afternoon of the i6th. By that time the communique had
already been flashed en clair by the Press all over the world,
and had actually reached Canadian and Australian news-
paper offices before the responsible Ministers had received
the Government despatch. These Ministers therefore found
themselves beset by anxious inquirers and also by eager
volunteers for service, before they themselves had received
any official information. This was vexatious to all con-
cerned. None of the British Ministers had foreseen that
the official telegram approved seventeen hours earlier and
with at least twelve hours’ start, would be overtaken and
forestalled by the newspaper messages. In any case, how-
ever, the issue of the communique was a separate decision
taken in consequence of the growing seriousness of the
situation and of the duty of the British Government to
warn the public.

The Dominion Ministers were in consequence placed in
a false position and were naturally incensed. They protested
vigorously against the procedure. The doubts, and on
the whole preponderating disapproval which had been felt
in the Mother Country of Mr. Lloyd George’s pro-Greek
policy and the general dissatisfaction at inter-allied handling
of the Eastern problem since the Armistice, were reflected
in the Governments and peoples of Canada and Australia.
Like the British public, they had not been conscious of the
protective influence of the Greek Annies behind which
we had all lived in peaceful futility for three years. Li k e
the British public, they could not readily comprdiend the
vast change which the destruction of these armies had
wrought in our affairs. Nevertheless, all the Dominions
responded to the call and declared their readiness if a great
emergency arose to bear their part, subject, of course, to the
consent of their Parliaments. By the night of September 16
the Government of New Zealand telegraphed that ' they
wished to associate themselves with the action which is
beuag taken and will send a contingent ' ; and on the 20th,

CHANAK

429

that * the House of Representatives had unanimously Response
endorsed the action of their Government ; and that over Do^uons.
five thousand volunteers had already registered their names
for active service.’ In a few days these numbers had
grown to twelve thousand from a community of fourteen
hundred thousand souls whose military manhood had already
been more than decimated in the great struggle. Similar
manifestations took place in Canada and in Australia,
and both these Dominion Governments were embarrassed
rmtil long after the actual crisis had passed by the press of
war-experienced men answering to the appeal. We attached,
of course, special importance to the responses of Australia
and New Zealand on account of the knowledge which the
Turks, and above all others, Mustapha Kemal, had acquired
during the Great War when in contact with the Anzacs.

There could be no greater deterrent upon violent Turkish
action than the possibility of again facing the formidable
volunteers of the Antipodes. It is beyond question that this
knowledge, which we took good care to convey, was a
definite factor in the eventual avoidance of war.

Meanwhile, the divergence between Britain and France
had led to a lamentable episode. On September 18 orders
from Paris withdrew the French detachments from the side
of their British comrades at Chanak and on the Ismid

Peninsula. The French troops were accompanied in their
retirement by the Italians, and the British Empire was left
alone to face the advancing Turkish armies. The advertised
departure of the soldiers of these two Great Powers was
likely to inflame the wildest ambitions of the Turks. What,
they might ask, could Britain, herself by no means convinced
of the issue at this time — ^Britain, the war-worn, the im-
poveridied, the demobilized — adiieve alone ? Henceforth
the Turks knew that only one Power stood in front of them.
Luckily they had at their head a leader who understood
a good many things.

We shall dehberately ignore and obliterate the scandalous
recriminations which took place when Lord Curzon went
to Paris on September 23. These were the worst years of
Anglo-French relations which the twentieth century with
all its stresses hais seen ; and this was the worst moment.

430 THE WORLD CRISIS : the aftermath

French and We have Tun through this had weather into better days.

j^to^ent. It is enough in epitome that the French said, ‘ We will stop
the Turk by diplomacy ’ ; and the British replied, ‘ Your
diplomacy would be worth nothing without our bayonets.
These are fixed.’

Meanwhile matters had passed for a space into the
militar y sphere. The control of the Straits would obviously
be facilitated if the fateful narrows of the Dardanelles
were occupied on both sides by our troops. This made it
desirable to hold Chanak on the Asiatic shore. It was a
valuable though, as I believe, not an indispensable outwork.
Originally the War Office had not contemplated holding
Chanak and on the nth General Harington had been told
that he might evacuate at his discretion. He appealed
against this decision on account of the importance of the
place as an advanced defence of the Gallipoli peninsula.
He was then told that he might hold it as if he were a
rear-guard.

Availing himself of this permission. General Harington
sent on the 19th the following order to the officer command-
ing Chanak, Major-General Marden : ‘ You should hold
Chanak as long as possible with the forces I have available.
I am communicating the decision to the Government. In
my opinion in view of the French withdrawing from Chanak,
Kemal will challenge British pohcy there. In all probability
he wiU stop to reflect, if you stop him there with naval
support. Your stand there may avert further trouble.’

And on the 20th he telegraphed to the War Office : ‘ If we
continue to show our determination, I am of opinion that the
British will be able to carry through the task without them
[i.e., the French and Italians], so that I do not consider you
need feel concern for their action. According to my inform-
ation his [Kemal 's] ministers are being summoned to Sm3rma
to-morrow for a conference. Evidently this is to decide
whether he will take England on with her Dominions. My
own opinion is they will not dare to do so.’

On the same day [September 20], the Cabinet faced the
position created by the withdrawal of the French and
Italians, and were advised upon the military aspect by the
chiefs of the stafiEs. Sound decisions were taken. General

CHANAK

431

Harington was informed that the defence of Chanak was MiHtary
his first duty ; that the defence of Constantinople itself
was secondary, and the defence of the Ismid Peninsula,
minor. On September 22 General Harington apprised
Mustapha Kemal through the Kemalist representative at
Constantinople that he was instructed to defend the neutral
zone. On the 23rd, eleven hundred Turkish cavalry entered
the neutral zone and moved to Eren-Keui. The British
general at Chanak warned the Turkish commander that
in entering the neutral zone he had committed an act of
war, and that he would be obliged to fire upon them if
they failed to retire. The attitude of the Turkish officer
was correct and reasonable, and the Turkish cavalry
withdrew beyond the neutral zone on the morning of the
24th. On September 25 they returned to Eren-Keui two
thousand strong, with machine guns. Here they remained,
contumaciously and encroachingly, but with much politeness
and parle3dng ; and in undoubted violation of the neutral
zone.

Both sides had an interest in gaining time, for the Turks
had only horsemen without artillery, and we were hurry-
ing reinforcements, artillery and aeroplanes to the scene
as fast as ships could carry them. At the outset Chanak
was defended on a four-mile front by only three and a half
battalions and two field batteries, supported of course by
the almost measureless gun-power of the Fleet. Naval fire
against land positions had made remarkable progress since
1915. The most powerful battleships of the Navy lay in the
stream supported by numerous cruisers and flotillas. All
objectives had been registered, and fire could be regulated
by unchallenged air observation. The infantry was therefore
supported throughout by an artillery certainly equal to that
of a whole army corps and possibly far above it. By the
26th Chanak was defended by six battalions, and three
new howitzer batteries were planted on the Gallipoli Pen-
insula. Thirty-six guns of medium calibre were on the way ;
sixteen eight-inch howitzers were embarking. The growth
of the air force was also substantial. The Pegasus with
her five seaplanes was joined on the 27th by the Argus
with six seaplanes and four fighters, and on the 28th by

The Chanak
Position.

432 THE WORLD CRISIS : the aftermath

thirteen machines of the 209th Squadron. Three additional
squadrons with thirty-six machines were due on October
9 and 10,

The Prime Minister asked me to preside over a Cabinet
Committee for the proper concerting of naval, military and
air force movements. The week from the 20th to the 28th
was one of anxiety. Information about the Turks was cloudy.
So far nothing but cavalry forces, quite incapable of attacking
entrenched positions, had appeared. But we did not know
where the heads of their infantry columns marching from
Smyrna to Constantinople actually were ; or whether they
would turn aside to assault Chanak, and what artillery
and ammunition they could provide for that purpose.
We only knew that we had a rather restricted but weU-
entrenched and well-wired position, air ascendancy, and
great artillery superiority, and that the Turks had neither
tanks nor poison gas. This was already a good deal. But
from the 28th onward, when our air supremacy became
marked and the howitzers came into line from Gallipoli, it
was quite certain that the British force could be dislodged
from Chanak only by a major operation of war. Certainly
on the western front in 1917 and 1918 no one would have
attempted to attack such a position without at least equal
artillery and air power in the zone of action, and with
probably two or three rifles to one on the actual fighting
front engaged. All experience shows that unless the artilleiy
of the attack has mastered that of the defence, and further
has pulverized their infantry positions, the mere pushing
forward of masses of infantry against machine guns and
well-trained riflemen and barbed wire means only a greater
slaughter the longer it is persisted in. And even when the
artillery has mastered the defence, it has been bloodily
proved upon a large scale a hundred times that without
tanks or gas the prospects of an assault are doubtful. ,

I had particularly in miud the repulse by the Anzacs
of the Turks on May 19, 1915, after the first -landing on the
Gallipoli Peninsula. Here the Anzacs with far less powerful
artillery and practically no air help had faced the best-
trained troops of the Turkish Regular Army at odds of more
than three to one. But the Tmks, charging with the utmost

CHANAK

433

bravery, withered before the fire, leaving so many thousands Strategic
of corpses between the lines that the only truce of the Galli- ance.
poli campaign had to be arranged by mutual consent for
sanitary purposes. After September 28 therefore there
seemed no reason to be uncomfortable about the tactical
situation at Chanak.

But it was the strategic situation which gave the real
reassurance. Why should a skilful and experienced soldier
and able man like Mustapha Kemal turn aside from his
march towards Constantinople and lead his worn and sorely
tried army against a British entrenched position ? What
would he gain in politics by driving the Britidi Empire
into war against him ? What would he gain in tactics by
squandering his men and scanty ammunition upon a local
cock-fight of this kind ? What would he gain in strategy
by delaying his march to the Ismid Peninsula and dose
contact with his adherents in Constantinople ? Every day’s
delay in arriving before Constantinople was perilous to him.

He knew that there was a Greek army in Thrace almost
the equal of his own. A military revolution in Athens had
followed the disasters in Asia Minor. Constantine had been
expelled, and the Greek military authorities had declared
their resolve to defend Eastern Thrace. Every day they
could gain for the reorganization of their forces and for
taking up advanced positions before the Chatalja lines was
injurious to Kemal. And there all the time lay Constanti-
nople, full of Kemalist adherents, with very little but the
blandishments and expostulations of M. Franklin-Bouillon
to defend it. In fact, Mustapha Kemal never diverted his
march a yard from his road. Like a wise man, he hurried
on as fast as he could towards the main and easy goal,
and used his flank guard of cavalry to give an appearance
of strength and aggressiveness towards the British at
Chanak. His cavalry ofl&cers had the strictest orders to
avoid conflict, and above all to get into friendly parley.

Their unabashed good hmnourwas proof against the severest
and most formal frowns. They made every effort to frater-
nize, and even ventured requests for camp-equipment and
the minor conveniences of campaigning. There never was
any danger to the British forces at Chanak. The menace

EE

My Memo-
randum of
September
30 -

434 THE WORLD CRISIS : the aftermath

was to Constantinople ; but the defence of Constantinople
in the absence of the other two Great Powers was not
primarily a British responsibility.

I made a note for our small group on September 30
which may so far as it is relevant be reprinted.

Chanak

Sept. 30, 1922.

We have hitherto prudently considered our position at
Chanak as if we were likely to be exposed to attack by the
whole of the KemaUst armies. It seems, however, unlikely
that this will occur. The Kemalists are already at war
with Greece, and their paramoimt object is to cross into
Thrace and defeat the Greek armies there. It is no use
their trying to get across the Dardanelles or the Sea of
Marmora. Their oidy practicable road into Europe is across
the Bosphorus or possibly across the Black Sea. It seems
probable that they are at the present moment, and have
been ever since the fall of Sm3nma, steadily re-forming
the main body of their troops towards the Ismid Peninsula
with a view to crossing the Bosphorus, and that all they
have done on the Chanak Peninsula is to send cavalry and
minor forces to net in the British and to plant a certain
number of guns on the unoccupied shores of the Dardanelles.

In any case it is clear that Kemal will have to choose
between marching into Thrace by the Bosphorus and
coming to grips with the Greek Army on the one hand, or
trying to overwhelm the British at Chanak on the other.
He would surelymake a greatmistake to adopt half-measures,
namely, weak attacks on the British at Chanak and insuffi-
cient forces to defeat the Greeks in Thrace. Let us examine
these two alternatives seriatim, taking the least probable
first.

If Kemal attacks Chanak with the main strength of his
army, of his artillery and limited ammunition, ample time
■will be afforded to the Greeks to get their army in
Thrace thoroughly reorganized and reinforced to the utmost
extent. . . .

If then he takes the second alternative, as he is probably
doing, he might in about three weeks be in contact with
the Greeks beyond the Chatalja lines. In this case he
would no doubt leave sufficient forces around Chanak to
close us in, but would not make any serious or costly attack.
Nor would he unduly use his ammunition from the Asiatic
shore of the Dardanelles upon ships passing ihe Straits,

CHANAK

435

From about the end of October he •will become deeply Kemai's
involved in Thrace. If we have taken the proper measures Alternative,
from the moment that hostilities have commenced, our
position will then be a very strong one. The command
of the Sea of Marmora and our naval strength will enable
us to move our forces in many directions with the utmost
rapidity. One cannot conceive a more wonderful system
of interior lines and of water communication than will be
at our disposal. . . . The position of the KemaUst army,
heavily engaged with the Greeks in Thrace, with its Une
of communications stretching along the Ismid Peninsula,
and a strong, compact British army crouched at Gallipoli
and Chanak ready with the help of the Navy to cut
those communications — such a position would indeed be
forlorn. . . .

The more the situation is surveyed, the more the strategic
advantages of the British position at Chanak and GaUipoli
will become patent. The dilemma which faces Kemal
will be painful in the extreme. He has either to break
his teeth against the British at Chanak while the Greek
armies grow stronger every day, or else to hurry into what
is virtually a death-trap in Thrace. . . .

There remains, as there nearly always does, a third h3rpo-
thesis, namely, that Kemal, if he recognizes the futihty
from his point of view of a serious and prolonged effort
against the British at Chaneik and the peril of becoming
embroiled in Thrace with the hostile British on his com-
munications, will recoil from both projects. In this case
we shall have attained our present objects without serious
hostilities. Negotiations will be resumed, but in a very
different atmosphere from those undertaken in Paris. If
as the result of these negotiations the Tmrks are allowed to
come back to Constantinople and Thrace, it need only be
upon such conditions as we may judge to be most likely
to secure a lasting peace. I trust the strength of our position
will be realized before we take any steps that would barter
it away.

The climax at Chanak was reached on September 28,
when General Harington reported that the Turks were
collecting in considerable numbers round the British position,

‘ grinning through the barbed wire,’ that they were clearly
acting under orders, that everything possible had been
done to avoid conflict, but that the position was becoming
impossible. He also reported that the British position at
Chanak was ‘ strong, well wired, and well sited.’ The Cabinet

436 THE WORLD CRISIS : the aftermath

Mndania. thereupon instructed tlie General to present an ultimatum
to the Turks to quit the neutral zone and sheer off Chanak
within a brief time-limit, and authorized him to use all the
forces at his disposal at its expiration. The General was able,
however, to tide over his difficulties without availing himself
of the formidable warrant with which he had been armed.
The tact, coolness and patience of General Harington were
exemplary. It so chanced that from the moment the
Cabinet sent the stem telegram, the Turkish provocation
which had given rise to it began to subside. On the 30th
the commander at Chanak (General Marden) reported that
there were no signs of Kemalist guns or infantry being
brought against him ; and that his force was not in danger.
And as every day’s delay made the British position stronger,
General Harington did not consider it necessary to send the
Turks an ultimatum, nor did any incidents occur which
required the opening of fire. The Cabinet, relieved by this
favourable development, on October i approved their
coimnander’s forbearance.

Meanwhile, after difficult discussions with the French, a
joint invitation had been sent to Mustapha Kemal on Sep-
tember 23 to a Conference on the shores of the Marmora at
Mudania. The invitation was accompanied by far-reaching
offers, mainly at the expense of Greece. The three Allied
Governments promised to restore to Turkey Thrace as far as
the Maritza and Adrianople, to withdraw from Constanti-
nople as soon as peace was made, and to support the
admission of Turkey to the League of Nations. Mustapha
accepted the invitation and fibred October 3. To Mudania
also proceeded the ineffable M. Franklin-Bouillon, whose
efforts were directed towards leading the Turks to hope for
more than they would ever get from Great Britain, and to
believe that the British were unable or unwilling in the last
resort to fight. Largely as a result of his activities a dead-
lock was soon reached, and the Allied representatives re-
turned to Constantinople on October 5. The French and
Italian High Commissioners, appalled by the prospect of
war, favoured unconditional surrender. Sir Horace Rum-
bold, however, stood firmly to the proposals of September
23 ; and General Harington was instructed from London to

CHANAK

437

make no further concessions. The news that the British The Crisis
were preparing an ultimatum became known to the Tinrks
through French or Italian sources. The continued arrival
of British troops, artillery and aeroplanes in the Dardanelles
was evident. When the Conference was resumed at Mudania
on October lo, the Turks were found ready after protracted
discussion to sign an armistice convention. This provided
that the Greeks should retire behind the Maiitza and that
Greek dvil authorities should evacuate Eastern Thrace.

On the other hand, the Turks agreed to recognize the neutral
zone and undertook not to raise an army in Eastern Thrace
until the ratification of the Treaty.

The story of Chanak is instructive in several ways. It
reflects high credit upon General Harington, who emphasized
the value and significance of the Chanak position and
tenaciously held to it, and who knew how to combine a
cool and tactful diplomacy with military firmness. There
is no doubt that the attitude of the British Government and
of the Dominions, particularly Australia and New Zealand,
prevented the renewal of the war in Emrope and enabled
all the Allies to escape without utter shame from the con-
sequences of their lamentable and divided policies. Con-
sidering the limited resources available, the public fatigue,
the precarious position of the Administration and its
declining authority at home and abroad, the achievement
of ' Peace with Honour ’ was memorable. It formed the
basis upon which a peace of mutual respect could sub- ,
sequently be negotiated with the Turks at Lausanne. The
strong action taken by Britain, so far from drawing upon
us the lasting enmity of the Turks, aroused a sentiment
of admiration and even of goodwill, and will make easier
rather than harder our future relationship with modem
Turkey.

* « ♦ * *

The Treaty of Lausanne followed in due course. It was
a surprising contrast to the Treaty of Sevres. The Great
Powers who had been so ready to dictate terms, not only
of peace but of national destruction, to the Turks now foxmd
themselves obliged to negotiate on far less than even terms.

TTie Turk was re-established at Constantinople. He re-

The Treaty
of Lausanne.

438 THE WORLD CRISIS : the aftermath

gained a large portion of Eastern Thrace. Every form of
foreign guidance and control was swept away. The capitu-
lations which for so many hundred years had protected
the traders and subjects of western nations in Turkey
against Oriental misgovemment or injustice were abolished.
The control of the fateful Straits reverted to the Turk under
the thinnest of disguises. Mustapha Kemal with prudence
resigned the Arab provinces of the Ottoman Empire to the
various mandatory powers, the fate of Mosul being re-
mitted to the decision of the League of Nations. By an
extraordinary series of provisions all the Greek inhabitants
of Turkey, and a still large but smaller number of Turkish
inhabitants of Greece, were reciprocally combed out and
transported to their natural sovereignties. Turkey lost a
great mass of citizens who had for centuries played a vital
part in the economic life of every Turkish village and
township. Greece, impoverished and downcast, received
an accession of nearly one and a quarter million refugees
who, imder the pressure of misfortune and privation, have
already become a new element of national strength. Even
these conditions were not obtained by Great Britain, France
and Italy without prolonged parley. They would not have
been obtained at all but for the skilful and persevering use
made by Lord Curzon of the prestige which Great Britain
had preserved through her stubborn attitude at Chanak.

The unhappy M. Gounaris, together with some other
Ministers and defeated Generals, was shot in Athens as an
expression of Greek disappointment at the results which
had flowed from the decision of the Greek electorate in
1921.

\\!':s'rKRN

THRACE

atliil

.ATTvAV'C

^cr Kara Surun

SanK»hr»v»

S’«®> j

P TtfnWtiiL iRwS^ ^' Uro»>iwi;A\V^ I

(ous^^y |'|ii«\K-'^\‘ ^ .:-;,v: 'Y ■ ViT A / / J

BfkfJKasri ^

1 bT

A. Mytilcnc^

-^K3

fsr^

// H
j

Smyrna

V

AP^I^K

/ / A- 1

Nikaria ^ Cla™S

pi. — -

]

xxC'b A\T

•Sv^:

vl'A

^1^, . Sakaria\/'X^

K \ \ \ \ _^

X v\ \

A \A\*Vx\

\\\\A \ \

^ ^ ^ \

7

CARAHISSAR

K_

i:

d)-.

1/ 'Sis’

4? ^

TURKEY

SCALE OF MILES

10 20 30 40 50 m

♦♦* frontier of Turkey 1914

., .. „ 1929

„... Line of furthest Greek Aduance
Sept 1921.

ssasr Frontier between Greece' & Turkey
prouisionaliy fixed by Treaty
of Sbures.

Skures neutralized zones.
lUi Lausanne neutralized >zones.
Railways.

'T^/Jrea covered rYfn^Area covered
I by map facing ^/'y/by map facing
''SA Page 401 \lzLC 2 Page 398

CHAPTER XX

THE END OF THE WORLD CRISIS

A General Survey — ^The Decisive Act — ^The German War-plan —
Mobilization and War — ^The Emperor's Test — The Deadly
Current — ^The Frontiers and the Marne — ^The Yser and the
Deadlock — ^The Goeben and Turkey — ^The Dardanelles — ^Defen-
sive versus Offensive — ^The Rhythms of History — President
Wilson's Part — ^War without Glamour — ^Ancient Limitations —
Modem Destructive Power — Only a Prelude — ^Universal Suicide
— Is it the End ? — ^France and Germany — ^British Policy —
— ^Locarno — ^The Twin Pyramids — ^The Urgent Task.

I T may be well in conclusion to pass in review the story
of the World Crisis to which these volumes Have made
their contribution. Time has given its perspective and
every year has brought a fuller knowledge. The proportion
of events becomes apparent and it is easier to discern the
hinges of Fate.

I have already, in the opening Chapter of Volume I,
summarized the causes by which Europe was brought to
the threshold of Armageddon. I have described as I saw
theni the events which preceded and produced the catas-
trophe. Nothing that has since transpired from the exposed
archives of so many States has modified the conclusions
which Volume I has already recorded. There could have
been no Great War if the rulers of Germany had not first
declared war against Russia and immediately launched
their armies upon the invasion and destruction of
France, trampling through Belgium on the way. The
attempt to gain the swift and decisive military triumph
which then seemed sure, was a definite conscious act and im-
pulse transcending all other events. The only test by which
' human beings can judge war responsibility is Aggression ;
and the supreme proof of Aggression is Invasion. Capacity
to invade a neighbour implies superior capacity to defend

439

A General
Survey :

The Decisive
Act.

The German
War-plan.

440 THE WORLD CRISIS : the aftermath

the native soil. The past has many instances of invasions
for the purpose of forestalling a counter-invasion. Disputes
as to responsibility for bringing about conditions which led
to various wars are endless. But mankind will be wise
in the future to take as the paramount criterion of war
guilt the sending of the main armies of any State across its
frontier line, and to declare that whoever does this puts him-
self irretrievably in the wrong. The violation of Luxemburg
and Belgium by the German armies marching upon France
win stare through the centuries from the pages of History.

The execution of this vast, elaborate war-plan was be-
lieved by the German leaders to be necessary not only to
the victory of Germany but to her safety, not only to her
safety but to her life. They therefore conceived themselves
bound to carry it out from the moment that the Russian
mobilization and the terms of the Russian alliance with
France compelled them to face the long-examined war on
two fronts against superior but more slowly gathering forces.
That this belief was sincerely held need not be questioned.
It was not, however, well grounded. No one would have
dared attack the Central Powers. The strength of the
German armies was so enormous, and the conditions of
modem war at that time so favourable to the defensive,
that Germany could — as events have proved — ^have afforded
to await with iron composure aU attack upon her frontiers.
Such an attack would never have taken place. If it had,
it would have been dashed to pieces by the German armies,
and the whole force of world opinion would have been
turned against Russia and France. There was in fact no
need of self-preservation for the awful plunge which Germany
took in consequence of the Russian mobilization. Let it
never be admitted that mobilization involves war or justifies
the other side in declaring war. Mobilization justifies only
counter-mobilization and further parley.

Was this too high a test for the moral fibre of any Govern-
ment, of any General Staff, of any military nation ? Would
it not have required superhuman restraint for Germany not
to have put her whole war-plan into operation after the
Russian mobilization had been ordered ? The answer is not
in doubt. It ought not to have been beyond the virtue and

THE END OF THE WORLD CRISIS 441

courage of so strong a State and so great a people. But on Mobiikation
the assumption — which we dispute — ^that mobilization meant
war, and — which we also dispute — ^that war meant the exe-
cution of the German war-plan for invading France through
Belgium, with aU its terrible implications, was not this all the
greater reason for prudence and patience while events still
rested in the regions of diplomacy ? What can be said of the
levity with which Germany gave Austria a free hand to
take what action she wished against Serbia and promised
German support without conditions, without even any
warning of the danger to European peace ? What can be
said for the German rejection of Sir Edward Grey’s proposal
of July 26 — before the Russian mobilization had begun —
for a European Conference ? If the next step led inexor-
ably, as we are told, to Germany feeling herself forced in
self-preservation to ‘ hack her way through Belgium,’ was
it not aU the more important to prevent that step from
being taken ? And here in a Eurapean Conference was a
simple and sure measure of preventing, or at the very least
of delaying, the fatal exodus from the diplomatic field.

The German Emperor was surprised and alarmed, and
his military advisers were fiercely excited, by the un-
3delding spirit which Germany encountered from the Triple
Entente in the final ten days. This unyielding spirit had
grown up over many years, during which the sense of
German preponderance and the fear of German aggression
upon land and sea had increasingly dominated the directing
minds in France, Russia and Great Britain. The shadow
had lain darkly over Europe since the beginning of the
century. These three Powers did not mean to be separated
and mastered one by one. France was bound by her treaty
to Russia, Britain under the growth of the German Navy,
though legally free, was morally committed to stand by
France, if France were the victim of aggression. The
Triple Entente could never have attacked the Central
Powers. It would have fallen to pieces at the first aggres-
sive move by any one of its members ; but its resisting
power in the face of attack was real and solidly founded.

If Germany would come to conference, there was no doubt
that the Austro-Serbian quarrel could be settled. If

442 THE WORLD CRISIS : the aftermath

The Germany did not attack, there would be no war. She

fwt*”*^* had no right to attack. If she did, it would only show
what sort of neighbour we had in the world and how wise
we had been to stand together..

The convulsive forces surging around the German Em-
peror, rigidly departmentalized, awkwardly connected or
even largely independent of one another, became in the
crisis impersonal and uncontrollable. Rational processes
departed and the machine took charge. Through the con-
fusion marched the ordered phalanx of the General Staff
bearing the Great Design. All was ready, and all would
be well — ^provided there was no hesitation at the top.
The deepening of the Kiel Canal was finished, and the Fleet
could move freely between the Baltic and the North Sea.
The fifty million pound capital levy of 1913-14 had filled
the arsenals with ammunition. The supplies of explosives
were assured by the new process of extracting nitrogen
from the air. The German armies were incomparable, and
the Schliefien war-plan sure. By a coincidence the Goeben
too was in the Mediterranean.

He aic 9|( i|e 3fc

William the Second was not the man to stand against
this assault. Those who have wished to judge him should
first of aU thank God they were not placed in his position.

* * 4c * *

The question arises whether apart from the European
conference proposed by Sir Edward Grey on July 26,
there was any means of averting the war ? We fre-
quently read statements to the effect that if he had
only shown courage and decision and had told Germany
plainly at the end of July that to attack France
would mean war with England, there would have been
no war. Lord Motley’s posthumous revelations of the
Cabinet situation should be convincing on this point.
Such a declaration by Sir Edward Grey at that date would
have resulted only in his complete disavowal by four-fifths
of the Cabinet and three-quarters of the House of Commons.
Mr. Asquith would have resigned, his Government split
into fragments, and the four or five tremendous days that
remained, in every hour of which indispensable precautions

THE END OF THE WORLD CRISIS 443

were being taken, wonld instead, have been filled by utter The Deadly
chaos from which no doubt a war decision would have
emerged too late for every purpose. A British threat to
intervene, if unwarranted by national authority, could only
have convinced Germany that we were impotent and
out of it.

To divert the deadly current it was necessary to
go back along the stream for months and years. If,
for instance, Germany had accepted the British pro-
posals of 1911 for a naval holiday, much might have
been possible. A European conference on land armaments
and the maintenance of peace would in such circumstances
have found England a S3mpathetic listener to aU that
Germany might have urged about the growth of the Russian
army and the perfecting of Russian strategic railways with
French money. The marshalling of Europe into two armed
leagues might have given place, tanporarily at any rate,
to a much more relaxed and easy attitude. But at the end,
in the final crisis, the British Foreign Secretary could do
nothing but what he did. To abandon France and Russia
diplomatically in the face of the German threat would have
been to break up for years all counterpoise against the ever
more assertive German power. To threaten war upon Ger-
many would have been repudiated by Cabinet, Parliament
and People, But no words of English Ministers were re-
quired to plead the policy of Sir Edward Grey. Hour by
hour as the German armies marched through treaties and
across frontiers upon defenceless Belgium towards an agon-
ized and cornered France, arguments resotmded far above
the feeble voice of man. The cannon gained by its first salvo
on Belgian soil a verdict for which aU the statesmen and
soldiers of the British Empire would have pleaded in vain.

When we consider the character of the German Gk)vem-
ment before the War, as now so fully revealed in aU the
published records and descriptions of the Emperor’s Court,
we almost fed that we may leave the issue to the long
justice of the German people. Let them never overlook
that if France, deserting Russia and false to her Treaty
obligations, had dedared neutrality, the German Ambassa-
dor in Paris had instructions to demand the surrender to

The

Frontiers
and the
Marne

444 THE WORLD CRISIS : the aftermath

German garrisons of the fortresses of Toul and Verdun, as
guarantee that that neutrality would be observed.

♦ )ii ♦ * ♦

Carnage and cannonade ! All Europe on the march !
Fifteen million bayonets seeking the breasts of an equal
number of faithful, valiant, pitiful, puzzled mortals ! We
have passed into the military sphere. Where are the
stepping-stones ? The incomprehension by the French
General Staff of the conditions of modem war ; the mad
rush forward in blue and red uniforms against the fire of
machine gvms and magazine rifles : the German invader
advancing, yet accorded all the advantages of the defence !
The flower of the French Army and its best regimental
ofl&cers shorn away in the Battles of the Frontier ! The
worst of all cases on the largest scale — defending your own
country by charging the invading bullets I Purblindness
to conditions already made bloodily plain among the
kopjes of Natal and in the millet fields of Manchuria !
No General in all History ever had the chance of Joffre.
He had only to say ‘ Let the attackers attack ; let them
learn that bullets kill men, and that earth stops bullets.'
In martial quality, in every attribute that preserves an
iron race, the French soldier of 1914 was at least the equal
of the best troops who marched against him.

And then the noble constancy of the French Army,
rising superior to defeat and misdirection, fighting as if
they were following Napoleon in his greatest days. Bloody
defeats all along the hne, eight marches to the rear;
obvious complete miscalculation ! Never a reproach, never
a murmur, never a ' Nous sommes trahis ! ' Determination
to conquer or die ; conviction that one or the other would
be accorded.

So we come to the Marne. This will ever remain the
Mystery Battle of all time. We can see more clearly across
the mists of Time how Hannibal conquered at Cannae,
than why Joffre won at the Marne. No great acquisition
of strength to either side — except that usually invaders
outrun their supplies and defenders fall back upon their
reserves— important, but not decisive. Not much real
fighting, comparatively few casualties, no decisive episode

THE END OF THE WORLD CRISIS

445

in any part of the immense field ; fifty explanations, aU The Yser
well documented, five hundred volumes of narrative and Seactock.
comment — ^but the mystery remains. What was the cause
which turned retreat into victory and gave the world time
to come to the succour of France ? Where vast issues
are so nicely balanced every single fact or factor may be
called decisive. Some say it was the generous onslaught
of Russia and the withdrawal by an inadequate German
Staff decision of two army corps from their wheeling flank ;
some say Gallieni and his leopard-spring from Paris, or
Joffre with his phlegm and steadfast spirit. We British
naturally dwell on the part played by Sir John French
and his five divisions : and there are several other important
claims. But if imder all reserve I am to dioose the agate
point on which the balance turned, I select the visits of
Colonel Hentsch of the German General Staff on the night
of the 8th and the morning of the 9th of September to the
Army Headquarters of von Billow and Kluck, either order-
ing by an excess of authority, or lending the sanction of
supreme authority to, the retirement of these armies.

There was no need for such a retreat. Speaking broadly,
the Germans could have dug themselves in where they
stood, or even in places continued to advance. It was only
a continued effort of will that was needed then and a
readiness to risk all, where all had been already risked.

The desperate battle of the Yser hes on a lower level
of crisis and decision. Both sides were exhausted, but
both were reinforced. A long grapple of weakened anta-
gonists, five times as bloody as the Marne, but never
presenting the supreme issue. And by this time the
defenders have Iccimed to dig, they have learned that
even a few hxmdred resolute well-armed, well-trained
infantry or dismounted cavalry may stop ten thousand
and kin half of them with bullets. This trick of infantry
on the defensive of digging holes in the ground and firing
rifles, a curious, newly discovered plan, is going to become
a habit in this aU-probing war, and now in 1914 there
are no technical means by artillery, gas, or tanks of over-
coming it. Thus we readh trench warfare, and Christ-
mas, and a breathing space.

446 THE WORLD CRISIS : the aftermath

The Goeben Here was the time for Peace. The explosion was over.

and Turkey, invaders of France had been brought to a standstill,
the defenders were not strong enough to attack them.
Deadlock along the fighting lines, bankruptcy of ideas in
the General Staffs. Far away on the Eastern front the
Germans had destroyed the Russian offensive, and farther
South the Russians had beaten the Austrians. Peace
now, before the world is ruined, before its capital is con-
sumed, before the whole life force of nations is melted
down ! Peace now at Christmas 1914 ! Here was the
first and best American opportunity. But no one would
hear of it. The Press and public opinion advanced to-
gether. The cup must be drained.

Break away then. Allies. Seek new theatres. Use the
sea power of Britain. Find the flanks of your enemy
even if you have to travel a thousand miles. . . . Use
Surprise, use Mobility, attack where none is ready to
resist. Vain to sit glowering at each other in ditches ;

mad to crawl out of them only to be shot down !

« * * * *

But meanwhile, in another part of the world, at present
apparently lapped in peace, a momentous event has
occurred. The German battle cruiser Goeben has arrived at
Constantinople. We need not retell by what chances she got
there. There she is ; and the Turks in consequence have
against the Russians the naval command of the Black Sea.
They are therefore able to join the Central Powers and to
carry out their long-prepared plan of invading the Caucasus
and wresting it from Russia. Collision therefore of Turkey
against Russia and entry of Turkey into the general
war I

But the arrival of this new enemy brings with it oppor-
tunities as well as dangers. It opens a vulnerable flank.
The opportunities are greater than the burdens. Swift,
then, the Allies. Leave the great armies scowling at each
other in the trenches and the great navies hating each
other in strict routine from widely separated harbours.
Break in upon this new weak opponent before he is on his
feet, beat him down by land and sea ; force the Dardanelles
by fleets and armies, seize Constantinople, join hands with

THE END OF THE WORLD CRISIS 447

Russia, rally the Balkans, draw Italy to your cause; and
then all together hew yoiir way into the naked belly of
Austria. Again very simple ; again very difficult.

The politicians are attracted, the Generals and A dmir als
mutter ‘To break away from a first-class war, the sort
of war that only comes once in a hundred years, for an
amphibious strategic-political manoeuvre of this kind
is nothing less than tmprofessional.’ Divided coimcils,
half-hearted measures, grudged resources, makeshift plans,
no real control or guidance.

However events move forward. On March 18, 1915,
Admiral de Robeck engages the forts of the Dardanelles,
seeking to force the passage. And here again we reach
an agate point. The Turks have very few mines, they
have sown all they have ; if these are swept up
they have none left — ^not a dozen. But luckily for
them twenty of these mines have been laid in an
unexpected quarter. The sweeping flotillas newly and
feebly organized have overlooked them.. Two or three
ships are blown up. The Admiral sustains a sinister
impression, he breaks off the attack ; he will never renew
it. Nothing will induce him to re-enter this area of
m3reterious danger. Although a fortnight later he is
equipped with mine-sweeping flotillas which in a few hours
could have cleared with certainty the whole area from
which he could engage the forts decisively, he will never
allow these flotillas to act. They remain courageous,
efficient and useless, and so does his fleet and so does he.
They all remain the spectators of a military tragedy. We
were condemned to the aimy attack upon the Gallipoli
peninsula. Now we know that not only were there no
more naines, but that the big guns of the forts, the only
ones that could stop armoured ships, had only a few score
shells remaining. A night's sweeping by the flotillas, a
morning's bombardment, must have revealed the bank-
ruptcy of the defence. However, it was otherwise decreed.
The Fleet recoils from aU idea of forcing the passage of
the Dardanelles ; the Army, after heroic efforts fails to
capture the key points of the Gallipoli peninsula. So the
flank attack is over ; it has failed, and we all return

The

Dardanelles.

448 THE WORLD CRISIS : the aftermath

Defensive heavily to the battle-front in France where nothing but

Ofi^ive. useless slaughter has in the meanwhile occurred.

4 : * « '

We have seen how important and possibly decisive was
the opportunity open to Germany at the beginning of
1916. If Falkenha57n had left the Allies to break their
teeth on the German entrenchments in the West, selling
where necessary the conquered territory for a sufficient
price in blood, and had marched against Russia in full
strength, he might well have compelled Roumania to join
the Central Powers and have gained the vast food and
fuel regions which stretched from Galicia to the Caspian
Sea. - He would thus have broken the naval blockade by
continental conquest, and gained from the land much that
the British Navy denied upon the sea. Instead, in approved
professional spirit he chose to gnaw the iron hills of Verdun
and their steel defenders. Thus were the Allies delivered
from the penalties which their strategic follies in 1915
had deserved, and the equipoise of the war preserved for
another bloody year.

During the whole of 1915 and 1916 the defence maintained
an immense advantage over the attack and the losses of
the assailants nearly always exceeded threefold those of
the defenders. But gradually the methods and resources
of the offensive improved. The whole front became so
heavily packed with guns and so laced by railways and
lateral communications that an increasing number of
alternative offensives were simultaneously open. The art
of camouflage made great progress ; almost unlimited
ammrmition was available. The artillery discovered first the
creeping barrage system, and secondly the power of opening
a correct fire without previously disclosing their concen-
tration by trial shots. The use of artificial fog, and above
all the invention of the Tanks and their emplo3anent in
great numbers, aU restored to the attacking armies the vital
element of surprise. Already in 1917 the sudden ' set-piece ’
attack began to achieve profitable results in its first stages
and the gradual diminution of the advantages of the defence
was increasingly apparent. 1918 witnessed the definite
recovery by the stronger armies of their prerogative to

THE END OF THE WORLD CRISIS 449

advance at the cost of superior losses. Ihe war of move-
ment was resumed by both sides in cumbrous fashion on
a gigantic scale.

4: * H: 4:

The third great climax of the war, successor to the
Marne and the failure at the Dardanelles, came at
the beginning of 1917. Russia collapsed in revolution.
But while this awful event was still among the secrets of the
future, the German General and Naval Staffs had forced
their Civil Government to sanction the unlimited submarine
campaign, and thus dragged the United States into the
combination against them. We have seen by what strange
fortrme the struggling Allies gained in the nick of time a
new giant in the West to replace the d3ung titan of the
East. Three months’ less resistance by Russia, three
months ’more patience by the German General Staff, three
months’ delay in launching the submarine campaign, and
that fateful challenge would never have been flung. Russia
would have been out without America being in. There are
few conjtmctures in history more worthy than this of the
attention of the strategist, the statesman, the moralist or
the philosopher.

But what should inspire the British people with wonder
and awe, is that this fortunate double event had occurred
in a different combination almost exactly one himdred years
before. In 1811 the supreme question was whether the
pressure of the British blockade would force Napoleon’s
allies and especially Russia to break away from him and his
continental system, before it provoked the United StatM
to enter the war upon his side. Here also by a few months
events followed a favourable sequence. Russia fell out
of the hostile combination before America entered it.
Napoleon was already marching all his armies upon Moscow
before the war of 1812 was declared between England and the
United States. Thus twice, and in two successive cen-
turies, England was not left quite alone to face the world.
Such mysterious rhythms of history will dim to the eyes
of future generations the hazards and drama of the Punic
wars.

« *

*

F F

The

Eh3rains
of History.

*

*

President

Wilson's

Part.

450 THE WORLD CRISIS : the aftermath

It is not necessary here to examine the important moral
and material contribution of the United States to the
general victory. But in the Peace Conference — ^to Euro-
pean eyes — ^President Wilson sought to play a part out
of all proportion to any stake which his country had
contributed or intended to contribute to European
affairs. Actuated by the noblest motives he went far
beyond any commission which the American Senate
or people were willing to accord him, and armed with
this inflation of his own constitutional power he sought
to bend the world — ^no doubt for its own good — ^to his
personal views. This was a grave misfortune ; for his
opportunity, though narrower than his ambition, was never-
theless as great as has ever been given to a statesman. The
influence of mighty, detached and well-meaning America
upon the European settlement was a precious agency of
hope. It was largely squandered in sterile conflicts and
half-instructed and half-pursued interferences. If President
Wilson had set himself from the beginning to make com-
mon cause with Lloyd George and Clemenceau, the whole
force of these three great men, the heads of the dominant
nations, might have played with plenary and beneficent
power over the wide scene of European tragedy. He
consumed his own strength and theirs in conflicts in which
he was always worsted. He gained as an antagonist and
corrector results which were pitifully poor compared to
those which would have rewarded comradeship. He might
have made everything swift and easy. He made every-
thing slower and more difficult. He might have carried
a settlement at the time when leadership was strong. He
acquiesced in second-rate solutions when the phase of
exhaustion and dispersion had supervened.

However as Captain he went down with his ship.

* Ik * * *

But all this lies in the past. It is a tale that is told,

from which we may draw the knowledge and comprehen-
sion needed for the future. The disproportion between
the quarrels of nations and the suffering which fighting
out those quarrels involves ; the poor and barren prizes
which reward sublime endeavour on the battle-field ;

THE END OF THE WORLD CRISIS 451

the fleeting triumphs of war ; the long, slow rebuild- War without
ing ; the awful risks so hardily run ; the doom missed by
a hair’s-breadth, by the spin of a coin, by the accident Linaitations.
of an accident — all this should make the prevention of
another great war the main preoccupation of mankind.

It has at least been stripped of glitter and glamour. No
more may Alexander, Caesar and Napoleon lead armies to
victory, ride their horses on the field of battle sharing the
perils of their soldiers auid deciding the fate of empires
by the resolves and gestures of a few intense hours. For
the future they will sit surrounded by clerks in offices, as
safe, as quiet and as dreary as Government departments,
while the fighting men in scores of thousands are slaughtered
or stifled over the telephone by machinery. We have seen
the last of the great Commanders. Perhaps they were
extinct before Armageddon began. Next time the com-
petition may be to kill women and children, and the dvil
population generally, and victory will give herself in sorry
nuptials to the spectacled hero who organizes it on the
largest scale.

*****

The story of the human race is War. Except for brief
and precarious interludes there has never been peace in
the world ; and before history began murderous strife was
universal and unending. But the modem developments
surely require severe and active attention.

Up to the present time the means of destruction at the
disposal of man have not kept pace with his ferocity.

Reciprocal extermination was impossible in the Stone Age.

One cannot do much with a dmnsy dub. Besides, men
were so scarce and hid so well that they were hard to find.

They fled so fast that they were hard to catdi. Human
legs could only cover a certain distance each day. With
the best wifi, in the world to destroy his spedes, each man
was restricted to a very limited area of activity. It was
impossible to make any effective progress on these lines.

Meanwhile one had to live and hunt and sleep. So on the
balance the life-forces kept a steady lead over the forces
of death, and gradually tribes, villages, and Governments
were evolved.

452 THE WORLD CRISIS : the aftermath

Modern The efiort at destruction then entered upon a new phase.

War became a collective enterprise. Roads were made
which facilitated the movement of large numbers of men.
Armies were organized. Many improvements in the appara-
tus of slaughter were devised. In particular the use of
metal, and above all, steel, for piercing and cutting human
flesh, opened out a promising field. Bows and arrows,
slings, chariots, horses, and elephants lent a valuable assist-
ance. But here again another set of checks began to oper-
ate. The Governments v^ere not sufficiently secure. The
Armies were liable to violent internal disagreements. It
was extremely difficult to feed large numbers of men once
they were concentrated, and consequently the efficiency of
the efforts at destruction became fitful and was tremendously
hampered by defective organization. Thus again there was
a balance on the credit side of Hfe. The world rolled for-
ward, and hmnan society entered upon a vaster and more
complex age.

It was not until the dawn of the twentieth century of the
Christian era that War really began to enter into its king-
dom as the potential destroyer of the human race. The
organization of mankind into great States and Empires and
the rise of nations to full collective consciousness enabled
enterprises of slaughter to be planned and executed upon
a scale, with a perseverance, never before imagined. All
the noblest virtues of individuals were gathered together to
strengthen the destructive capacity of the mass. Good
finances, the resources of world-wide credit and trade, the
accumulation of large capital reserves, made it possible to
divert for considerable periods the energies of whole peoples
to the task of Devastation. Democratic institutions gave
expression to the will-power of miUions. Education not
only brought the course of the conflict within the compre-
hension of every one, but rendered each person serviceable
in a high degree for the purpose in hand. The Press afforded
a means of uni fi cation and of mutual encouragement ;
Religion, having discreetly avoided conflict on the funda-
mental issues, offered its encouragements and consolations,
through all its forms, impartially to all the combatants.
Lastly, Science unfolded her treasures and her secrets to

THE END OF THE WORLD CRISIS 453

the desperate demands of men and placed in their hands Only a
agencies and apparatus almost decisive in their character.

In consequence many novel features presented themselves.
Instead of merely starving fortified towns, whole nations
were methodically subjected, or sought to be subjected, to
the process of reduction by famine. The entire population
in one capacity or another took part in the War ; all were
equally the object of attack. The Air opened paths along
which death and terror could be carried far behind the
lines of the actual armies, to women, children, the aged,
the sick, who in earlier struggles would perforce have been
left untouched. Marvellous organizations of railroads,
steamships, and motor vehicles placed and maintained tens
of millions of men continuously in action. Healing and
surgery in their exquisite developments returned them again
and again to the shambles. Nothing was wasted that could
contribute to the process of waste. The last dying kick
was brought into military utility.

But all that happened in the four years of the Great War
was only a prelude to what was preparing for the fifth year.

The campaign of the year 1919 woiild have witnessed an
immense accession to the power of destruction. Had the
Germans retained the morale to make good their retreat to
the Rhine, they would have been assaulted in the summer
of 1919 with forces and by methods incomparably more pro-
digious than any yet employed. Thousands of aeroplanes
would have shattered their cities. Scores of thousands of
cannon would have blasted their front. Arrangements were
being made to carry simultaneously a quarter of a million
men, together with all their requirements, continuously
forward across' cormtry in mechanical vehicles moving
ten or fifteen miles each day. Poison gases of incredible
malignity, against which only a secret mask (which the
Germans could not obtain in time) was proof, would have
stifled all resistance and paralysed aU life on the hostile
front subjected to attack. No doubt the Germans too had
their plans. But the hour of wrath had passed. The
signal of relief was given, and the horrors of 1919 remained
buried in the archives of the great antagonists.

The War stopped as suddenly and as universally as it

Universal

Suicide.

454 THE WORLD CRISIS : the aftermath.

had begtm. The world lifted its head, surveyed the scene
of ruin, and victors and vanquished alike drew breath. In
a hundred laboratories, in a thousand arsenals, factories,
and bureaux, men pulled themselves up with a jerk, turned
from the task in which they had been absorbed. Their
projects were put aside unfinished, unexecuted ; but their
knowledge was preserved ; their data, calculations, and
discoveries were hastily bundled together and docketed ' for
future reference ’ by the War Offices in every country. The
campaign of iqig was never fought ; but its ideas go march-
ing along. In every Army they are being explored, elabo-
rated, refmed under the surface of peace, and should war
come again to the world it is not with the weapons and
agencies prepared for 1919 that it will be fought, but with
developments and extensions of these which will be incom-
parably more formidable and fatal.

It is in these circumstances that we entered upon
that period of Exhaustion which has been described as
Peace. It gives us at any rate an opportunity to consider
the general situation. Certain sombre facts emerge solid,
inexorable, like the shapes of mountains from drifting mist.
It is established that henceforward whole populations will
take part in war, all doing their utmost, all subjected to the
fury of the enemy. It is established that nations who
believe their hfe is at stake will not be restrained from using
any means to secme their existence. It is probable — ^nay,
certain — ^that among the means which will next time be at
their disposal will be agencies and processes of destruction
wholesale, unlimited, and perhaps, once launched, uncon-
trollable.

Mankind has never been in this position before. With-
out having improved appreciably in virtue or enjoying
wiser guidance, it has got into its hands for the first time
the tools by which it can imfailingly accomplish its own
extermination. That is the point in human destinies to
which all the glories and toils of men have at last led them.
They would do well to pause and ponder upon their new
responsibilities. Death stands at attention, obedient, expect-
ant, ready to serve, ready to shear away the peoples m
masse ; ready, if called on, to pulverize, without hope of

THE END OF THE WORLD CRISIS 455

repair, what is left of civilization. He awaits only the word
of command. He awaits it from a frail, bewildered being,

long his victim, now — ^for one occasion only — ^his Master.

*****

It is not without self-questioning and dierishing of hope
that I have chosen the title of this chapter : The End of
the World Crisis. Certainly the story ended with 1922 in
universal gloom. No peace had been made acceptable
to Germany or giving security to France. Central and
Southern Europe had broken into intensely nationsJistic
fragments sundered from each other by enmities and
jealousies, by particularist tariffe and local armaments.
Russia was, as she is still, beyond the pale. Her people
he prostrate under the hardest tyranny yet seen in Asia.
Her rulers, mocked by natural and economic facts, are con-
demned by their creed to an indefinite process of self-im-
poverishment and self-torture. The United States in 1922
had shaken the dust of the Old World off her feet and dwelt
in opulent, exacting and strongly arming seclusion beyond
the ocean. Turkey, resuscitated in a new fierce form, re-
established in Constantinople and Europe, freed from her
capitulations and foreign guidmce, reigns henceforth with un-
trammelled sway over such Christian and non-Moslem inhabi-
tants as have not been destroyed or expelled. The League
of Nations, not yet reinforced by Germany, imder the derision
of Soviet Russia, abandoned by her mighty trans-Atlantic
parent, raised h frail and unsure bulwark against stormy
seas and sullen clouds. The Parliaments ^ected so hope-
fully by the nineteenth century were already, over a large
part of Europe, being demolished in the twentieth. Democ-
racy, for which the world was to be made safe by the greatest
of struggles, incontinently lets slip or casts aside the instru-
ments of freedom and progress fashioned for its protection
by rugged ancestors, England, bowed by debt and taxa-
tion, could only plod forward under her load. And at this
dark moment new misfortunes approached. China dissolved
into a sanguinary confusion. France sundered from Eng-
land stood mobilized upon the threshold of the Ruhr. No
end to the World Crisis in 1922 I

Mercifully our knowledge extends beyond the limits of

Is it the
End?

France and
Gennany.

456 THE WORLD CRISIS: the aftermath

our tale, and the years that have followed have teen lighted
by a series of efforts to consolidate world peace. Although
these efforts are partial and at present disconnected, each
has made a contribution to the supreme cause, and all have
aided the process of appeasement.

The Peace Conference had proposed to solve the problem
of French security in the face of a united and preponderant
Germany l3dng on both banks of the Rhine, by the joint
promise of the British Empire and the United States to
come to the aid of France if she were the victim of unpro-
voked aggression. The French assent to the Peace Treaty
had been obtained upon this basis. A tripartite agreement
between the three Powers concerned had accordingly been
signed by their plenipotentiaries, subject to Parliamentary
confirmations. The Imperial Parliament in due course
accepted the undertaking entered into by its representative
on its behalf. The Senate of the United States repudiated
President Wilson’s signature. The joint agreement there-
fore lapsed. The balance of the arrangement to which
France had consented was upset, and a situation tense with
fear and danger arose. The Prime Ministers of Australia
and New Zealand, at the Imperial Conference of 1921,
declared that they would advise their Parliaments to stand,
together with the Imperial Government, to their engagement
to come to the aid of France, although the United States
had dropped out. The growing divergencies between French
and British policy and sentiment at this time left the issue
in suspense. Meanwhile, France, sundered from England,
abandoned by the United States, isolated and in the deepest
alarm, yielded herself to military influences and trusted to
her unquestionable armed superiority. We may take the
entry of France into the Ruhr in 1923, and the consequent
arrest of German economic revival, as the darkest moment
for Europe since the fighting stopped.

The central problem was therefore at this time quite
untouched. First and foremost stood the overpowering
issue between France and Germany. Deep in the soul of
France, and the mainspring of her policy and of almost her
every action, lay the fear of German revenge. Sombre and
intense in the heart of the powerful classes in Germany

THE END OF THE WORLD CRISIS 457

brooded the resolve that their national history should not France and
be finally determined in accordance with the Treaty of
Versailles ; and in the pulses of her multiplying and abound-
ing youth throbbed the hope that they might live to see, or
die in advancing, a day when victory should once again
light the standards of the Fatherland. On the one hand
was displayed the armed and organized strength of France,
her overflowing arsenals, her mechanical and technical
apparatus, her African reserves, her innate imdying mili tary
qualities — ^all based upon a dwindling population and the
surprises of an ever-changing science of destruction. On
the other rose the mighty German nation, sixty milli ons
against forty, with its lusty generations, its sense of injury,
its laboratories, its industry and its highly disciplined
orderly intelligence. Cruel had been the experiences which
Germany had tasted in the Great War. But among all its
lessons no facts could be found which would justify despair
of future military successes. Almost single-handed the
German armies had fought the world, sustaining or driving
into battle her allies whose weakness or inefficiency were
from the outset patent ; and before France could be saved
from the ruin which was prepared for her, all the life energy
of Russia, of the British Empire, of Italy, and much of the
power of the United States had had to be consumed or ex-
erted in an intense degree. But would those conditions ever
return ? Need Germany contemplate a situation in which
once again all the greatest nations and empires of the world
would march successively to the aid of her ancientadversary?

There then, on both sides of the Rhine, was the root of the
matter; and in 1923 no one could feel assured that a
future generation would not see Europe laid in dust and ashes
as it had been in this same quarrel more than once before.

The policy of Britain in the face of such potentialities
was fortunately understood by all parties in the State.

Great Britain could have no other object but to use her
whole influence and resources consistently over a long
period of years to weave France and Germany so closely
together economically, socially and morally, as to prevent
the occasion of quarrels and make their causes die in a real-
ization of mutual prosperity and interdependence. The

Locarno.

458 THE WORLD CRISIS : the aftermath

supreme interest of the British people lay in the assuagement
of the great feud j and they had no other interest comparable
or contrary to that.

The Labour Government under Mr. Ramsay Macdonald
in 1924, by the London Convention and the Dawes Agree-
ment, paved the way for the memorable event of 1925.
Mr. BMdwin’s administration enjoyed, not only unques-
tioned power, but the assurance of a prolonged period for
its exercise. In these conditions of national strength and
stability a Foreign Secretary was found with the vision and
the courage to run greater risks for peace than the Ministers
of any other nation had yet dared. Discarding aU ideas of
a dual arrangement between Great Britain and France to
counteract the power of Germany, Mr. Austen Chamberlain
embarked resolutely upon the policy, suggested by Herr
Stresemann, of a threefold pact of mutual security be-
tween France, Germany and Great Britain, in which
Great Britain would be solemnly pledged to come to the aid
of whichever of the other two States was the object of im-
provoked aggression. The histories may be searched for a
parallel for such an undertaking. Nevertheless, it was from
the outset steadfastly endorsed by all classes and parties
in Great Britain. The great enterprise was pressed forward
by the experience and skin of M. Briand, and by the aston-
ishing civic courage of Herr Stresemann and other leaders.
It received at the culminating point the reinforcement of the
whole strength of Italy, wielded by the far-seeing realism of
Mussolini. Innumerable difficulties were overcome. Pro-
cesses of agreement which might well have required a
decade of perseverance were accomplished in the negotiations
of a few months. The co-operation of the smaller Powers
was procured ; and on October i6th, 1925, by the waters of
a cahn lake, the four great Western democracies plighted
their solemn troth to keep the peace among themselves in all
circumstances, and to stand united against any one of their
number who broke the compact and marched in aggression
upon a brother land. The eventual Treaty of Locarno was
agned, as was fitting, in London where the main impulse of
thepolicy had originated, and was duly ratified by all the Par-
liaments concerned. It had been throughout conceived in

THE END OF THE WORLD CRISIS 459

harmonious accord with the Covenant of the League of
Nations, to the Council of which Germany as a consequence
now brought her mighty power. Thus was achieved the
greatest measure of self-preservation yet taken by Europeans.

The Treaty of Locarno may be regarded as the Old World
counterpart of the Treaty of Washington between the
United States, Great Britain and Japan, which in 1921
had regulated and ensured the peace of the Pacific. These
two august instruments give assurance to civilization.
They are the twin pyramids of peace rising solid and un-
shakable on either side of the Atlantic, conomanding the
allegiance of the leading nations of the world and of all
their fleets and armies. They form the granite cores
around which the wider conceptions of the League of
Nations and the idealism of the Kellogg Pact can rear the
more spacious and more unified structures of the future.

The task is not done. The greatest exertions must
continue to be made over a long period of years. The
danger of war has by no means passed from the world.
Old antagonisms are sleeping, and the drum-beat of new
antagonisms is already heard. The anxieties of France and
the resentments of Germany are only partly removed.
Over the broad plains of Eastern and Central Europe, with
their numerous new and highly nationalistic States, brood
the offended shades of Peter and Frederick the Great and
the memories of the wars they waged. Russia, self-outcast,
sharpens her bayonets in her Arctic night, and mechanically
proclaims through self-starved hps her philosophy of hatred
and death. But since Locarno, Hope rests on a surer
foundation. The period of repulsion from the horrors of
war will be long-lasting ; and in this blessed interval the
great nations may take their forward steps to world organ-
ization with the conviction that the difiliculties they have
yet to master will not be greater than those they have
already overcome.

The Twia
Pyramids :
The Urgent
Task.

APPENDIX

A Memoranbum upon the
Pacification of the Middle East

The situation that confronted His Majesty's Government
in Iraq at the beginning of 1921 was a most unsatisfactory
one. The system of direct British administration, which
had been maintained since the Armistice, had broken down
in the previous summer when a local rising on the Euphrates
developed into a serious rebellion which was suppressed
with much difiGiculty and with the aid of reinforcements
sent from India. A large and costly military garrison still
remained in the country. Order had been restored but the
future was dubious in the extreme. The events of 1920
had brought the Iraq question strongly into the limelight
and a violent agitation had been started in the Press and
elsewhere against the whole policy of the Britidi Govern-
ment. Criticism was directly mainly against the heavy
expenditure entailed upon the British taxpayer, already
staggering under the financial burden left by the war ; but
in some quarters it took another line and represented that
our troubles were due to our failure to give efiect to war-
time promises of independence for the Arabs.

After the rising of 1920 it became evident that there
must be some change of policy. In the autumn of that
year Sir Percy Cox had been sent out to Baghdad as
the first British High Commissioner and had lost no time
in setting up a provisional Arab Government under the
presidency of the Naqib of Baghdad, a venerable figure,
who commanded great respect not oiily in Iraq itself but
in the Mohammedan world outside its borders.

Prior to 1921 different departments of His Majesty’s
Govermnent had dealt with the different Middle Eastern,
areas conquered during the war. The affairs of Palestine
and Trans- Jordan were in the charge of the Foreign Office ;
those of Iraq in that of the India Office. Early in 1921
the Government decided to place these matters under a
single Department, viz., the Colonial Office, to which I had
recently been appointed ^ Secretary of State. A new

461

APPENDIX

462

Middle East Department was accordingly established at the
Colonial Of&ce and came foimally into existence on March i,
1921.

My first step was to summon a conference at Cairo, over
which I presided personally and which was attended by all
the principal officers concerned in the administration of
Middle Eastern affairs. The main upshot, so far as Iraq
was concerned, was that the Emir Feisal was invited to
proceed to Baghdad as a candidate for the throne of Iraq.
Though not of Iraqi origin, he had very special qualifications
for the post. He came of the Sherifian family which, as
guardians of the Holy Places at Mecca, commanded wide
veneration throughout the Islamic world. His father, Sherif
Hussein (afterwards for a time King of the Hejaz), had
organised the Arab revolt against the Turks during the war.
He himself had fought gallantly on our side and had taken
part in the various exploits of desert warfare with which
the name of Colonel Lawrence will always be associated.

The Emir Feisal set out for Iraq in June, 1921. At the
same time I announced in the House of Commons that his
candidature had the approval of the British Government.
On the Emir’s arrival it was decided, on a resolution by the
existing Council of Ministers, that a referendum should be
held throughout the coimtry on the question of his election
to the throne. The referendum was duly carried out
throughout Iraq, with the exception of one purely Kurdish
area, which preferred to hold aloof. The result was that
96 per cent, of the votes cast were in Feisal’s favour, and
he was crowned King at Baghdad on August 23, 1921. He
at once entrusted the Naqib with the formation of his first
Cabinet.

In this way direct British administration in Iraq definitely
ceased. It was replaced by an Arab Government, acting
indeed on British advice, but acting on its own responsibility
and not under external dictation. A large number of
British officers were retained in the country, but they were
retained either in an advisory capacity or as technical
officers subordinate to the Iraq Government.

The next task that lay before the British Government was
to regularize the whole position. We had agreed, at the
San Remo Conference of April, 1920, to assume the position
of Mandatory for Iraq under the League of Nations. The
draft of a formal ‘ mandate ’ was submitted to the League
in December, 1920, but owing to various difficulties this
draft had never been formally approved. In October, 1921,
we obtained a kind of ad interim authority from the League
in the shape of a letter from the President of the Council

APPENDIX

463

inviting us to continue to carry on the administration of
Iraq in the spirit of the draft mandate until such time as
the position should have been regularized- But while the
League hesitated, the local situation did not. Iraq advanced
rapidly under our ^dance. The term ‘ mandate ’ acquired
an impopular significance in the coimtry. It was held to
imply a degree of tutelage which the new State considered
that it did not require. It was a case of the ‘ protectorate ’
in Eg37pt over again. As a way out of the difficulty, it
was decided to conclude a treaty with the King of Iraq,
ostensibly as between equals, which would (1) define in
detail the relations between the two countries and (2) place
the British Government in a position to discharge towards
the League of Nations those obligations which it would
have incTirred under a formal ‘ mandate.’ This treaty was
duly signed at Baghdad on October 10, 1922. Shortly
after its signature the Coalition Government in England
went out of office and I ceased to be Secretary of State for
the Colonies. The treaty of October, 1922, left various
matters of detail to be dealt with subsequently in a niunber
of subsidiary Agreements. These subsidiary Agreements
(Military, Financial, Judicial, etc.) were eventually con-
cluded in March, 1924. In September, 1924, the Treaty
and Agreements were laid before the Coimcil of the League
of Nations and were accepted by them, with the addition
of certain other assurances given by the British Government,
as giving adequate effect in respect of Iraq to the mandatory
principle as defined in the Covenant of the League. By this
means the whole position was eventually placed on a regular
juridical basis.

Internally, the progress of the' Iraq State has been marked
by successive constitutional steps. The first step was the
election of a Constituent Assembly, whose business was to
frame a constitution for the country. This was done in the
form of an Organic Law passed by the Assembly on July 10,
1924. Having discharged its ftmctions the Assembly was
dissolved and was replaced in due course by the first Iraq
Parliament which came into being in 1926.

A question which long caused much trouble both esdemally
arid internally was that of the Turco-Iraq frontier. The
Turks claimed the retrocession of the whole of the Mosul
vilayet, i.e., about one-third of the whole coimtry, including
the- most fertile areas. The Treaty of Lausanne (1923) left
the question open. Much controversy raged over the matter
and at one time there was serious danger of hostilities with
the Turks. Ultimately the matter was referred to "^e
League of Nations and a frontier was laid down which

APPENDIX

464

maintained the rights of Iraq over practically the whole
vilayet. The Turks accepted the fait accompli. The
frontier was delimited by a mixed Commission without
serious friction and friendly relations have not since been
impaired.

Of the other matters dealt with by the Cairo Conference
it is not perhaps necessary to say much. As regards
Palestine, the Conference did little more than confirm the
policy previously adopted and still maintained. In Trans-
jordan there have been developments. The Amir AbdixUah,
a brother of King Feisal of Iraq, was permitted to establish
himself as ruler of the country. The experiment has on
the whole been a success. The Amir’s Government, though
it left a good deal to be desired in its early stages, has shown
marked improvement of recent years. Public security and
public contentment have definitely improved. We have
dtn±ng the past year concluded a Treaty with the Amir very
much on the lines of that with King Feisal, providing for a
constitutional regime in Trans-Jordan. This Treaty awaits
ratification.

Turning again to Iraq, it is necessary to mention one
further change of the highest importance that was intro-
duced in 1923. In October of that year military control
in the country was transferred from the War Of&ce to the
Air Ministry. It may safely be claimed that the change
has proved an immense success. It has resulted in a pro-
gressive reduction in the cost of the garrison and conse-
quently in the burden imposed on the British taxpayer.
At the beginning of J921 the strength of the British garrison
in Iraq stood at 32 battalions plus Artillery, Engineers,
etc. By July, 1921, the number had been reduced to 23
battalions, and a further reduction to 12 battalions was
started in October of that year. In the year 1922—23 pro-
vision was made for 9 battalions {plus other services) for
the first half of the year and for 6 battalions during the
second half. The process of reduction was continued tmtil
in the year 1928 provision was made for no more than one
Indian battalion and one Sapper and IVIiner Company, both
of which were withdrawn on the ist November last. There
are now (apart from the R.A.F.) no regular military units,
British or Indian, in the whole country. In order to
accelerate the pro^amme for relieving Imperial troops a
force of native Levies, imder British command, and paid for
by ^e British Treasury, was raised in 1921—22. These
Levies at one tune reached a strength of 4 Infantry Bat-
talions, 3 Cavalry Regiments, i Pack Battery and ancillaries.
The force has now been reduced to 2 Battalions.

APPENDIX 465

The cost of the British Garrison in Iraq during the past
seven years has been as follows : —

1921/2 .
1922/3 .

1923/4 -

1924/5 .
1925/6 .
1926/7 .
1927/8 .

^^20,097,684

£6,6x0,554

£5,033,790

£3,847,224

£3,314,813

£2,753,775

£1,648,038

In 1928 it was decided to show the normal cost of defence,
exclusive of the cost of the Levies and of the ‘ extra * cost
of the British garrison, in the War Office and Air Minis try
Estimates with the exception of Indian troops ; conse-
quently, figures are not available beyond 1927/8.

The Air Force in Iraq in 1921 consisted of 6 Squadrons
which, in the following year, were raised to 8 Squadrons plus
armoured car Companies. By April, 1928, the strength had
been reduced to 5 Squadrons plus 6 sections of Armoured
Cars.

It is worth recording that this striking reduction of
military strength (with corresponding financial retrench-
ment) has been carried through without a hitch and without
any resultant disturbance in Iraq. When the nature of the
country is considered, its vast distances, the unsettled
natmre of many of its inhabitants and its huge desert fron-
tier, over which really effective control is impossible, it may
fairly be claimed that the results achieved have been
astonishing. It must be remembered, moreover, that the
difficulty with the Ttuks was not finally resolved until the
end of 1925. All the plans made in the earlier stages were
based on the assmnption that there would be an early
settlement with Turkey. This assumption was falsified for
nearly five years. Yet the plans were duly carried put and
no disorder or mishap resulted. There has, in fact, been
nothing in the nature of serious disturbance since the rising
of 1920. There have been difficulties from time to time in
outlying Kmrdish areas and there have been serious raids
, (particularly last winter) by the Wahabi tribesmen who owe
allegiance to Ibn Sa'ud. But these are conditions that
have always to be reckoned with and must be taken as they
come. There is no reason to suppose that they cannot be
dealt with in future as effectively as in the past.

To sum up, the policy inaugurated in 1921 has been con-
tinued up to the present time. Like other policies, it has
had its ups and downs. There have been moments of diffi-

G G

APPENDIX

466

culty and of danger. In spite of these, however, it has
been steadily pursued, often in face of fierce and unscrupu-
lous press criticism at home, and has achieved a measure of
success which few of us thought at all probable eight years
ago.

INDEX

“Adalia (Turkey), 130, 364
Addison, Dr., 34
Afium-KArahissar, Battle of, 418
Air Force, International, 'Z'j
Alexander, King of Greece, 385

— death from monkey bite, 386
Alexeiev, General :

— death, 87

— raises a counter-revolution, 86
Allenby, Lord, 360
Alsace-Lorraine, 206
Anarchists in Russia hunted

down and shot, 80
Anderson, Sir John, 322
Anglo-French relations, 421, 429
Anzacs at Gallipoli, 432
Archangel, deputation from, at
War OfiS.ce, 244
Armenia, 403—8, 416
Armenian National Council, 98
Armies of Occupation, Explan-
atory Note, by Mr.
Churchill, 56-9
Armistice dream, 22—7
Army demobilization, 52—71

— enters Germany, 65

— mutmies, 61

— strength after Armistice, 371
Asquith, Rt, Hon. H. H. (after-
wards Earl of Oxford and
Asquith), 39, 40, 335

— and Adiianople, 356
Asser, General, 68—9
Austria, 227—9
Austria-Hungary, 223
Azerbaijan, 98

Baker, Stannard, 12 1—5

— credits General Bliss as

author of Lloyd George's
* Some Considerations for
the Peace Conference,' 197-8

Baker, Stannard, garbles record
of Wilson's wishes, i86-“7

— quoted, 185, 363
Balfour, Earl, 132, 135

— and Wilson's Fourteen

Points, 107-8

— Memorandum on Russian

afiEairs, 165

— proposals to Conference on

peace, 189-90
Balkan League, 380
Baltic States, 98, 100
Barnes, Rt. Hon. G. N., 38, 43,

135

Belfast : riots in, 62, 317, 322
Belleek, 336, 337, 338
Bessarabia, 98, 103
Bieberstein, Marschall von, 356
Birkenhead, Lord, 301, 337, 356
{note)

Black and Tans, 287, 289
Bliss, General, 125

— credited by Mr. Stannard

Baker as author of Lloyd
George's ‘ Some Considera-
tions for the ^Peace Con-
ference,' 197-8
Blockade of Germany, 66-7
Bohemia, 225, 227
Bolshevik treachery to Czecho-
slovak Army Corps, 91—5
Bolshevism, 79

— See also under Communism ;

Russia

Borden, Sir Robert, 135
Botha, Louis, 135
Bowman, Dr. Isaiah, 125
Brand, *President, 336
Brest-Litovsk, Treaty of, 82
Briand, M., 416

Britain's position at the end of
the war, 17—18

467

INDEX

468

Biitain^s position if war had been
lost, 215

British Empire Delegation, 21 1—
12

British forces in North Russia,
T918-19 : casualties, 244
Brusilov, General, 70
Buchan, John, quoted, 85
Bulgaria, 229—30
Bullitt Mission, 176
Burleson, Mr., U.S. Postmaster-
General, 124
Byng, General Lord, 61

Calais mutiny, 61—2

Carson, Lord, 281

Cavell, Edith, 157

Cecil, Lord Robert, 135, 146, 161

— and a League of Nations,

r46

Chamberlain, Sir Austen, 301,
337

Chamberlain, Neville, on Irish
settlement, 320
Chanak, 409-38
Channel Tunnel, 218
Childers, ErsMne, 305, 350
Churchill, Rt. Hon. Winston S. :

— advice to General Denikin,

255

— and British aid to Denikin,

259

— at War OfS.ce, 52-71

— becomes responsible for

carrying out Irish Treaty,

3x0

— constrained to promise his

constituents that the Kaiser
should be brought to trial,
44

— criticized by Stannard Baker

and Nowak, 185-6

— enters the War Office as

Secretary of State, Jan. 14,

1919, 169

— Explanatory Note ; Armies

of Occupation, 56-9 ^

— extract from speech on Irish

question, 312

— General StafE memorandum

on the army slrength after
the Armistice, 371

Churchill, Rt. Hon. Winston S. :

— letters to Michael Collins,

322-8, 330 - 3 345-7

— letter to Mr. Cope on Irish

affairs, 349—50

— letters to Sir James Craig,

332- 3. 347-8

— letter to Lord Curzon on

Genoa Conference, 414—16

— letters to Lloyd George on

Irish affairs, 303-4, 338

— letter to Lloyd George on

situation in Europe, 377-8

— letter to Mr. Griffith, 323

— Memorandum on Chanak,

434-5

— Memorandum on Russian

Civil War, 256— 9

— notes on Russian affairs, 1 7 5-7

— Official Communique on

Chanak, 426—7

— on difficulties of Poland, 264-7

— on German indemnity, 47—9

— on the Greek tragedy, 394-7>

402-3

— on Limerick and Tipperary

disturbances, 321

— on withdrawal of army from

North Russia, 238-9, 240—1

— Preliminary survey of Irish

Settlement, 314—16, 318-

20

— speaks on Russian affairs to

President Wilson, 17 1—2

— speech on Irish affairs, 341-2

— speech on Peace Treaty, 211-

12

— statement on Irish affairs,

333 - 5

— survey of General Denikinas

conquests, 251—3

— telegrams to Earl Balfour and

Sir Henry Wilson on repa-
triation of German prisoners-
of-war, 68

Clemenceau, M., 23, 24, 25, 26,
126, 136, 365, 369

— and Mr. Hughes, 152—3

— and President Wilson, 192

— and Wilson's Fourteen

Points, 107—18

— at Peace Conference, 171

INDEX

Clemenceau, M., discusses con-
stitution of Peace Confer-
ence, 136-7

— fired at, 189

— replies to Lloyd Gorge's

' Some Considerations for
tlie Peace Conference,* 197
ClifEord, Rev. Dr., 36
Clones, constabulary ambus-
caded, 321, 322, 325
Collins, Michael, 305, 306, 309,
310, 313, 314, 3x7, 321, 329,
332, 333 i 335 > 33^, 337 .
343 . 345 > 34S

— meets Sir James Craig, 317

— murder of, 348

— valedictory message to Mr.

Churchill, 348

— sketch of, 33^7. 349
Commissions appointed, 153
Communism : a dose of Com-
munism induces a desire in
any population to welcome
any other form of civilized
authority, 102

Communism, Russian, 70—85

— See also under Bolshevism ;

Russia

Condouiiotis, Admiral, 387
Conscription, 42

Constantine, King, 380, 381, 382,
3S5. 3S6, 387, 388, 389, 392,
393, 412, 416, 417
Constantinople, 373-4

— occupied by British, etc., 375
Cope, Mr., 321

Cosgrave, Mr., 335, 349
Council of Four, 141
Council of Ten, X41, 143, 144,
145, 150, 152, 153, 190, 19X
Craig, Sir James, 292, 293, 295,
313. 322, 324, 326, 327, 328,
332, 34 ^. 347

— meets Michael Collins, 317

— offers to meet delegates ftom

Southern Ireland, 316
Creel, George, 1^26-7
Croats, 223

Cromw^’s Ironsides, 65
Cnnliffe, Lord, 49, 154
Curzon, Lord, 373, 388, 391, 392,
412, 413, 429, 438

469

Curzon, Lord, and ‘ Hang the
Kaiser/ 42

— Memorandum on Russian

Civil War, 236-7

— on Turkey, 361
Czecho-SIovak Army Corps, 91—5
Czecho-Slovak Army Corps in

North Russia, 246-50
Czechoslovakia, 223, 224

Dalton, Commandant, 343—4
Dantzig, 209— xo
Dardanelles, attack on, 447
Deaths under Commumsm, 74—5
Demobilization, 52—71
Denikin, General, 87, 97, X64,
166, 266, 275, 276

— military effort and conquests,

250-61

— raises a coimter-re volution,

86

Dennis's foreign Policy of Soviet
Russia, 121

De Robeck, Sir John, 447
De Valera, Mr., 292, 293, 295,
297 > 298, 299,?'3oo, 308-11,
324, 325, 329, 330, 332, 333,
339

— and ' Saorstat Eiraenn,* 298
Dietrichs, General, 245
Djavid, 356, 370

Dominions asked to send rein-
forcements to repel Turks,
424-9

Dominions' Prime Ministers, 152
Dublin Law Courts seized, 324
Duggan, Mr., 305, 309, 331
Dukhonin, General, Russian
Commander-in-Chief, mur-
dered, 81

Eitel Fritz, Prince, 159
Enver, 356, 359^ 3 ^. 3 ^
Equality of sacrifice, 25
EsMsheto, Battle of, 398—402
Esthonia, 100

Esthonia declares independence,
98

Eupen, 206

Falkenhayn, 448
Feilding, General, 63

470

INDEX

Feisal, King, 140, 309, 37^

Ferid Pasha, 370, 375, 376
Finland declares independence,

98

Finland invaded by Bolsheviks,

99

FitzAlan, Lord, 292^

Foch, Marshal, 24^ 25, 114, 168,
222, 376

— and the left bank of the

Rhine, 217-18

— at Peace Conference, 171

— on armies of Koltchak and

Denikin, 273

Food shortage in Germany, 66-7
Four Courts attacked by Michael
Collins, 343

Fourteen Points, 104-19, 204
France : disproportion of

national power between Ger-
many and France, 216-22
France and Turkey, 41 1, 413
Frankhn-BouiUon, M., 41 1, 421,
433 . 43O

Fraternization, orders against, 65
Freedom of the seas, 109—14
Freeman*s Journal prohibited,
284

French, Lord, 445

— attempted murder, 284
French army, 444

— fleet mutiny at Odessa, 168
Fryatt, Captain, 157

Gaida, General, 179, 245, 246
Gallieni, 445
Geddes, Sir Eric, 54
General Election, 39-51
Genoa Conference, 414-16
George V, speech on Ireland,
294-5

George of Greece, Prince, 386
George, Rt. Hon. David Lloyd,
23, 24, 25, 27, 38, 41, 49, 55,
67, 126, 133, 135, 136, 137,
306, 365, 366, 369, 373, 374,
387. 392, 414. 421, 426, 427

— advises the’ Pohsli Govern-

ment, 269

— and aflairs in Ireland, 289,

290, 292, 295, 297. 298, 299

— and ‘ Hang the Kaiser," 43

George, Rt. Hon. David Lloyd,
and Irish delegates, 305

— and President Wilson's Four-

teen Points, 107—18
— ^ and reparations, 156

— announces that the Kaiser

was to be tried in London,

159

— character at the height of his

power, 20

— declares the British accept-

ance of the mandatory
principle, 15 1

— on German indemnity, 46

— on the Greeks, 391

— on Irish question, 337—8

— on Polish Report, 191

— presents ultimatum to Irish

delegates, 305—6

— resolves on an Election, 39

— * Some Considerations for the

Peace Conference before they
finally draft their terms,"

193-7

— suggests that representatives

of Moscow should be sum-
moned to Paris, 170

— telegram on Russian affairs,

174

— violated Liberal sentiments,

37

— warns Kamenev and Krassin,

268

Georgia forms an independent
national government, 98
German and Austrian armies
invade Russia after Treaty
of Brest-Litovsk, 84
German prisoners-of-war, 67—9

— Revolution, 1 99-201
German-Turkish plans, 357
Germany :

— advantages gained from the

Peace, 214

— blockade and food shortage,

66-7

— decides to send Lenin to

Russia, 72

— disarmament, 219—22

— indemnity, 44—50
Gladstone, W. E., on Home Rule

Bill, 296

INDEX

471

Glasgow : riots in, 62
Goehen, 358—60, 446
Gounaris, M., 412, 413, 414, 417,
438

Grattan quoted, 352
Greece, 379—408

Greek army attacks Ismid Pen-
insnla, 376

— monarcliy in 1908, 379
Greeks ask permission from the

Allies to enter Constanti-
nople, 417

— land in Smyrna, 365—9
Greenwood, Sir Hamar, 310
Grey, Sir E., 441, 442
Grifi&th, Arthur, 305, 306, 309,

310, 313, 314, 316, 326, 329,

331. 335> 337. 346. 347

— death, 348

— elected President of the Dail,

309

Guchkov, 76, 77

Haig, Earl, on scheme of de-
mobilization, 53, 55
' Hang the Kaiser,* 142—3
Hankey, Sir Maurice, 134, 144,

199

Harington, Six Charles, 424, 425,

427. 435. 436, 437. 430. 431

Heamshaw, F- J, C., 75
Hentsch, Colonel, 445
Hindenburg, Field-Marshal von,
offers to deliver himself up
to judgment, 159
Hoffman, General, 82
Holland declines to surrender the
Kaiser, 159, 160

Hollis, Christopher, quoted, 124
Holman, General, 259
House, Colonel, 106-7, 108, 109,
no. III, 112, 113, 114, 116,
118, 121, 125, 132, 146, 185,
189

— and Wilson*s Fourteen Points,

106-18

— on garbled record made by

Stannard Baker of President
Wilson*s wishes, 1S7
Hughes, Mr., 135, 154

— and M. Clemenceau, 152—3

Hungary, 223, 227, 228
Hurst, Sir Cecil, 147, 161

Imperial Russian treasure, 247
Inter- Allied Commission, 154
Iraq, Memorandum, 461—66
Ireland, 277—352

— and the Allies, 36

— assassinations, 284, 285, 286

— conscription question, 281

— Home Rule Bill, 285

— Irish Delegates arrive at

Downing Street, 301—2

— Macready*s report, 293—4

— Treaty of agreement signed

by Irish delegates, 306

— Treaty, voting figures, 339
Ironside, General, 242

Italy seizes Adalia, 364
Italy*s entry into the wax, 129

Janin, General, 247, 248, 249

Japan and intervention, 89—90

Joffre, General, 444, 445

Johnson, Colonel, 95

Jones, Professor Thomas, 298

Jonnart, M., 385

Jugo-Slavia, 223, 224, 226, 227

Kaledin, leader of the I>on Cos-
sacks, commits suicide, 87
Kemal, Mustapha, 356, 367, 370,
376, 410, 411, 417, 422, 424,
426, 429, 430, 431, 433, 436,
438

Kerensky Government, 70, 72,
77 . 78, 79
' Key men,* 53
Keynes, J. M., 155
Kitchener, Lord, and Ireland,
280

Knox, General, on the Siberian
armies, 245—6

Koltchak, Admiral, 97, 241, 242,
245, 246, 247, 248, 249, 256,
276

— murder of, 249

— Note from the Supreme Coun-

cil to Koltchak, May 26,
1919, 180-2

— reply to Supreme Council, 182

— sketch of his policy, etc., 178

INDEX

Korfanty, 214
Kornilov, General, 77, 78

— killed, 87

— raises a connter-revolution,

86

Krilenko, Ensign, made Russian
Commander-in-CMef, 82
Kun, Bela, 140, 143, 227

Lament, Mr., 154

Lansing, Mr., 115, 117, 121, 125,

131. 132. 137

Latvia, 100

— declares independence, 98
Lausanne, Treaty of, 437
Law, A. Bonar, 38, 41, 55

— speech on Irish ajffairs, 342—3
Lawrence, Colonel, 140, 309, 360
League of Nations, 23, 26, 141—

62, 185

— draft Covenant presented,

161

— r See also under Wilson, Presi-
dent

Lenin, 83, 84, 90

— issues order to * Loot the

looters,' 80

— on after-efiect of Treaty of

Brest-Litovsk, 84—5

— sketch of, 73—6

— treachery to Czecho-Slovak

Army, 92

Leontev, General, 359
Literature of the Peace Confer-
ence, 121
Lithuania, 100

— declares independence, 98
Locarno, Treaty of, 458-9
Lockhart, Mr., British Repre-
sentative at Moscow, 90, 93

Londonderry, Lord, 346, 347
Long, Lord, 285
Ludendorff, 73, 105
Lusitania, 157
Luton Town HaH burnt, 61

Macdonald, Ramsay, 458
Macdonogh, Sir George, 55
Macready, Sir Nevil, 290, 343,
344

— report upon state of Ireland,

^ 93-4

* Make them pay,’ 153
Malinovsky, 249
Malm6dy, 206

Mandatory principles, 1 50—3

Mannerheim, General, 99

Mtoos, Mile, 385, 386

Marden, General, 430, 436

Marne, . 444—5

Masaryk, Ih-ofessor, 91, 94

Massey, Mr., 135

Maurice, General, 41

Max, Prince, 105

Mermeix, M., 121

Midleton, Lord, 323

Miller, David Ilimter, 121, 125,

147

— General, Russian, 244
Milyukov, 76
Ministry of Munitions, 35

— of Reconstruction, 34
Mobiliziation, 440—1
Monta^, Mr., 34, 373, 392
Mudania, Conference at, 437
Mulcahy, Richard, 313
Munition workers, 33—5
Murmansk, withdrawal from,

^37-9, 244, 275
Mutinies in the army, 61

' Nameless beast,' 71
Nationality, 205

Newspapers and the Peace Con-
ference, 137-9

Nicholas, Czar, abdication of, 71

— Grand Duke, 405
Nitti, Signor, 121
NorthclifEe, Lord, 38, 39, 191
Noske, 200—1

Nowak, M., quoted, 134, 186

O’Brien, Art, 297
O’Connell, General, kidnapped,
343

O’Connor, Rory, 324

— seizes the Four Courts, 324,

343 . 344

— shot, 349
Odessa, French at, 167
0 £Q.cial language at Peace Con-
ference, 139

O’Higgiiis, Kevin, 313, 335, 345,
349 - 350

INDEX

473

Omsk Government, 96, 164, 185
Orlando, Signor, 126^ 365, 366
— leaves Conference, 193
Oxford and Asquith, Earl of.
See Asquith

Paderewski, M., loi
Party politics, 36-9
Paul, Prince, 386
Peace Conference, 120—41

— Treaties, 202—31
Pepelaiev, M., murder of, 249
Petlura, 251, 252, 255, 256, 266
Pettigo, 336, 337
Phillimore, Lord, 146, 161
PUsudsM, Josef, loi, 266
Plumer, Lord, 424

— urges that food be supplied

to Germany, 67
Poincare, M., 416, 421
Poland, 100, 191, 262—76

— re-birth of, 207—11
Poles and Bolsheviks, 252—3
Poynings' Act, 309

Press and the Peace Conference,

137-2

Prince's Lsland proposal, 172—3
Prinkipo, 170, 172

Rawlinson, Colonel Sir Alfred,
367 (note)

— General Lord, ordered to

Archangel, 242
Redmond, John, 280
Reparations, 153—6
Robertson, Sir William, 63
Roosevelt, Theodore, 127
Roumania, 103, 129, 227
Rmnbold, Sir Horace, 436
Russia :

— Anglo-French Convention of

Dec. 23, 1917, 166

— Balfour's Memorandum on

Russian atEairs, 165

— events in, 60-103 ; 163-83,

— gives up struggle for Allies,

84

Russian Civil War, 232—76

— Volimteer Army, 87, 97

Saar Valley, 207

Sadleir-Jackson Volunteer Bri-
gade, 242

Sakaria, Battle of, 400—2
Saorstat Eireann, 298
Sarolea, Professor, on estimate of
number of deaths under
Communism, 75
Savinkov, Boris, 77, loi

— on Riissian Civil War, 233
Schleswig-Holstein, 207
Secret treaties, 129—33
Self-determination, 203—4
Sevres, Treaty of, 374, 375, 376,

334> 390, 419

Siberia, Allied intervention, 95—7
Sinn Fein Members, 282—4, ^ 9 ^-
292, 293

SkoropadsM, General, 102
Slovaks, 226

Smuts, General, 54, 135, 146,
150, 161, 21 1

— produces draft of a League of

Nations, 147
Smyrna, 365-9, 4^9
Soldiera, behaviour of, after
demobilization, 65
Sonnino, Baron, and President
Wilson's Fourteen Points,
107-9

Soviets. Bolshevism ; Com-
munism ; Russia
Statistics of number of persons
killed by Boldieviks, 74-5
Stevenson, Sir James, 34
Sumner, Lord, 154
Supreme Coxmcil, 143, 144, 153

— Note to Admiral Koltchak,

180—2

Sykes-Picot Agreement, 361, 375

Talaat, 356, 360, 369
Tardieu, M., 12 1
Tartar National Coimcil, 98
Temperley, Br., 121, 146
Tirpitz, Admiral, 349
Transcaucasian Federal Gtovem-
ment, 98

Treaties, secret, 129-33
Trenchard, Marshal of the Air
Force, Sir Hugh, 310
Tricoupis, General, 41S

474

INDEX

Trotsky, 83, 84, 90

— serves Allied Ambassadors in

Petrograd with proposals
for armistice, 81

— treachery to Czecho -Slovak

Army, 92. 93
Tumulty, Mr., 193
Turkey, 353“78
Turkey and France, 41 1, 413
Turkey enters the war, 130
Turkish atrocities, 416—17

— battleships requisitioned by

Britain, 358

Ukraine, 102

— declares independence, 98

— French land at Odessa, 167
Ulster, 311-12, 318

United States and intervention,
90

United States Senate repudiates
Treaty, 222

Upper Silesia, 210-11, 213

Venizelos, M., 365, 366, 369, 375,
376, 379, 380. 381, 382, 383,
384> 385, 386, 387, 388, 389,
390

Vienna, Congress of, 120
Von der Goltz, General, 99, 100

Wages and munition workers, 33
War and its modem destructive
power, 451-5

— criminals, 156-9, 160
Ward, Colonel John, 95, 164, 246
Weygand, General, 271
White, Mr,, 124, 125

Wilde, Oscar, quoted, 42
William III, German Emperor,
42, 43, 44, 158-9
Wilson, Sir Henry, 169, 288, 294,
386, 373, 383

Wilson, Sir Henry, murder of,
339 - 40 > 342

Wilson, President, 27, 144, 145,
146-7, 150, 162, 170, 171,
172, 366, 369, 412, 450.

See also under league of
Nations

— adverse to intervention by

Japan, 90

— and Clemenceau, 192

— and his Fourteen Points, 104—

19, 203-4

— approves the work of the

' Balfour period,' 190

— Baker's Woodrow Wilson and

the World Settlement, 12 1—5,
129, 130, 131, 132, 133, 138,

147

— declares that a League of

Nations must become an
integral part of the Treaty of
Peace, 145

— doubts about the credentials

of President Wilson, 149

— effect of victory on, 22

— estimate of services to the

Allies, 122, 128

— misgivings as to results of

Peace Conference, 126—7

— on Turkey, 362—3

— second voyage to America,

184—9

— wants to leave Conference for

home, 193

Women in war industries, 33
Worthington-Evans, Sir Laming,
288

Wrangel, General, 260

Yser, Battle of, 445
Yudenitch, 255

Zinoviev, 76, 83, 258-9

Printed in Great Britain by Butler & Tanner Ltd., Frome and London

AIDE-de-CAMP’S LIBRARY

Accn. No

1 . Books may be retained for a period not
exceeding fifteen days.